moments in another time
by twigcollins
Summary: Friendship, failure and triumph in the Archadian Empire. Game rewrite. A Conspiracy of Cartographers, pt. 5. Ghis, Bergan and unexpected opportunity.
1. a moment in time

It is an exceptionally beautiful place, the cemetery kept green and well tended at the edge of a cliff, overlooking what seems to be the whole of Archades, washed golden and breathtakingly beautiful in the setting sun. If it were any other day, Cid would be grateful, but that place is empty inside him. He can barely feel the cool wind on his face, an airship passing by close enough that he might jump out to touch it, just lean forward…

The corner of his lip quirks up, for just a moment. Cid had wondered if his feelings of detachment were real, if he truly had not loved his wife properly, but it seems the grief is merely more than he can handle, with duties left to attend to. He cannot leave his son an orphan, no matter if a grand, romantic gesture might absolve him of his failings.

It promises to be a very bad night.

Cid cannot afford this place, not with his title or even the best of his connections - this is a resting ground for great men - emperors and leaders and fallen heroes of war. It is not for the wives of scientists, no matter how much right she has to be here, for her grace and beauty, as fine a wife and mother and citizen as this empire ever deserved.

A good line, that, for a speech he never made and now never will. He let the priest do the talking, even as he felt eyes boring into his back. So many angered by his silence, by his swift refusal to let Ffamran find solace in the comfort and companionship of his wife's rather large and extended family, living comfortably but far distant from the capital.

His son will have more opportunities here, already showing promise in his classes, praised for his quick mind and pleasant manner. Cid may have had some part in that mind. The rest - the boy is his mother's son, a far better destiny, even if he must now face it alone.

Cid's refusal is the final insult, to a family that had never believed he deserved their daughter. Cid never actually disagreed, certainly not now.

It is not the view, the heights that cause the world to dip beneath him, and he shuts his eyes for a moment, swallows, not wanting to see what he must, what he knows awaits him.

Ffamran has been here for some time, sneaking away at the first opportunity, while Cid greeted mourners and shared condolences - his wife knew so many people, and Cid so shockingly few of those. At least he had all possible excuse for any impolite behavior, for not attending to all the formalities. This was a time for feeling lost. For wondering how he would go on. For staring at the chair in his wife's sitting room, the beautiful marble floor, a piece of work in a hoop in a basket half-finished, as if his memory and his need might be enough to conjure her home again.

So beautiful. Charming, and sweet-natured, and gentle. He did not deserve her, felt only a constant awe, disbelief at his own good fortune when she would smile, clasp his arms to hers when he caught her up in an embrace. Laugh and chide him as she drew her hand across the stubble on his cheek, when he would spend too long at work, forgetting all else, even his son and the wife who loved him.

She had always forgiven him. Even this time, the nurse had said. An entreaty not to trouble him, not when he was so busy.

He still has so much to do. Cid knows he could bury himself in his work for a month at this point, and never have to come up for air. The temptation is profound, in spite of what it has already cost.

If he had been in the city, he could have been to her in hours, not days. He had not even found out she was ill until they had already established themselves in the wilderness - so fast, so swift a sickness, even though she had always been delicate and he should have known. More than one mourner forgiving him as a matter of course, a few of the women taking his hands - it had all happened so quickly. No one could have expected such a thing, so young a woman taken so fast.

He has no idea just how long Ffamran was left alone with her body.

Cid says nothing, approaching the grave. His son might be crying, hands clenched into fists at his sides.

He remembers the boy in his arms, newly born, tiny fists ready to reach out and grasp at his glasses whenever they were in reach, laughing in delight. The boy knew him from the glint off of glass and metal before he knew much else of the world, and Cid had taken the infant to his lab more than once, tucked safely against his chest, looking down at pens and wrenches and beakers with wide, quiet eyes, and the two of the had spent many pleasant hours together there.

It didn't last, his son showing little interest in scientific pursuits even though he had a keen mind. Cid understood - neither of his own parents, nor his brothers and sisters had ever made much sense out of the hours he'd spent alone, save for the time he'd blown a hole in the wall of his room, and when he'd killed his mother's second best rose bushes testing out a new way to hinder weeds. It had never been necessary, or even expected, for the boy to follow in his footsteps.

He puts his hands on Ffamran's shoulders. The boy flinches, ducking under his grasp, turning to stare up at him. Not mourning, but _furious_, though there are tears in his glittering eyes, the sudden movement enough to spill a few of them on his cheeks.

"Son…"

"I'm not your son!" Fierce and unyielding, the purity of youthful emotion, with no gray areas. Waiting for this moment. All day, just for this, and now he fights to get the words out. He probably had a whole speech prepared, a list of failings, but there's too much anger to bother with them now. "I… I hate you!"

Cid is lost. He deserves it, as his son pushes past him, sprinting down the well-kept path, feet sounding loudly off the stones in the otherwise quiet space. For a moment, it seems important to follow him, the responsibility of a father - but what can he say? All the facts stand against him. He was not there when he should have been, he did not return as fast as he should have. He was not there. Not even the first time the boy had stared at him accusingly, ignoring his mother's protests and admonitions. He was an important man. He was doing great things for the Empire.

It was not right, that Cid had been forgiven so many times. She should not have been so understanding. He did not deserve her. Obviously.

Cid kneels down next to the smooth stone, rubbing a thumb over the engraving of her name, expertly notched lines in smooth script, the last record of her in this world. He shuts his eyes. Cid does not cry, has never been able to, although it would make things so much easier. Instead he can feel the grief locked up inside of him, pushing at skin and bone, pressure building without a safety valve.

"It is difficult. I lost my own mother at about his age."

Vayne leans, one hand lightly against a plinth belonging to a family Cid has never heard of. His wife would have known. She was the one who entertained, kept social calls. Probably deflected more criticism of her absent husband and his all-consuming work.

He will live in his lab now, despite his best intentions. Cid knows the choice will cost him his son, whatever is left that Ffamran might even forgive him for. He doesn't know what else to do.

He does not stand up from where he is kneeling, though Vayne doesn't care, any more than he cares for such genuflections when he appears at the lab, quietly observing whatever project Cid has his hands in. Asking questions with a genuine interest - most nobles couldn't care less how things work as long as they do so without delay. He's a bit coltlike still, caught just at the edge of adulthood, yet there is already a sense of power and dignity, shoulders braced to bear the great weight of his family's name.

"I am deeply grieved. I would have called you back sooner, had I known." Ostensibly, all that Cid had ever done was for the Emperor, not his son. Yet there was nothing obligatory in Vayne's words, or in the fact that Cid knew then who was responsible for securing this tribute, this grave for his wife.

"It's all right. It happened so fast, and she…" He nearly chokes. She did not complain. She did not want to disrupt him. She must have wanted him to come, though. Must have waited, frightened, some part of her certain he would not disappoint her. Ffamran had been there, alone. They had been waiting for him.

"He will forgive you someday, for not being able to save her, Perhaps before you forgive yourself."

The thought startles him, glancing up at that deceptively young face.

"It was… incurable. I could have done nothing."

"Yet, do you believe it? You, the greatest scientific mind in the Empire, helpless?"

It hurts, badly, though it is a truth lancing a festering wound, meant to heal rather than hurt. It _is_ what he is thinking, that this was not a tragedy but a _failure_, that if he had loved her enough, if he had but tried - and that he might still… that somehow… even though that is the stuff of legends and fairy tales, none of which ever end well.

"My father, the Emperor, not bound by the laws and limitations of other men, and yet there were truths to face. A father is not a god. It is difficult for a son to learn."

A hand on his shoulder. It is the first offer of real comfort, not simple politeness. Lord Vayne Carudas Solidor knows of death, even at his young age, and that the future holds only more of the same. Regrets that cannot be avoided, mistakes made, and disappointments despite the best of intentions. "He will forgive you."

"I loved her so much." Cid whispers, leaning forward, until his cheek is against the stone. Stubble, he hasn't shaved in days. It would make her laugh. His whole body seems to shake, more profound than tears, a bit of wetness in his eyes and nothing further. Vayne's hand slips away from his shoulder, though he is still there, quiet and knowing, not about to let him wander off into oblivion. Foolish and shameful, perhaps, that he needs to be herded by a princeling only a little more than half his age - but has Cid learned anything from the extra years given to him? He had thought so, once.

It is a comfort, whatever his failings, to have an ally. A friend. Some say House Solidor has no friends, that they can barely afford allies, a nest of vipers. Cid can't imagine the young man would bother with all this, just to secure an allegiance he already has, but it doesn't matter much either way. He is staggering blind down a dark and dangerous corridor, and now Vayne has lit a candle at the far side, a beacon by which to make his way through.

He will need every inch of light in the days ahead.


	2. blood is compulsory

A bucket of crabs rests at his feet, with a few irritated, slow clanking noises coming from inside. The sea breeze is fresh and wild, teasing at his hair and clothes. Vayne loves the ocean, has loved it since the very first time he saw it. The false promise of eternity, of unseen wonders and some vast, uncharted shore. It must have been true, a long time ago, before airships could travel without obstacle.

He has seen much of the world already, and still so young, but all of it through the lens of the Empire, of his position and responsibility. Instantly, he can see the potential utility of a place, its value in coin and loyalty, and where it stands on the great chessboard that is Ivalice, pawn or rook against Rozarria. The whole world has been built and set and named long before he ever arrived, to step into it like a player with lines written and cues at the ready. It is rare that he can enjoy a place for himself, as himself - and that means less and less by the year - and there is something very pleasant about Balfonheim.

It is the weather, the sea and sun and wind, and the people as well. Exotic and strange – and that just the humes - and each of them unique, a country unto themselves. Everyone seems to come from far away, all traveling under a name that is not their own. None of the strictures, the rules or social orders that leave Archades looking petrified in comparison - and yet some of them here long to travel there, imagine it as their perfect world. Everyone in Balfonheim has a desperate goal - longing for freedom, for status, for money or adventure or love. Needing more than they have no matter how much they have. He's been pickpocketed twice since arriving.

In the bucket, the crabs continue wholeheartedly with the goal of insuring their shared doom, quickly reaching up to pull back the ones who manage to get anywhere near freedom.

Did his brother feel safe here? Did he think the Emperor wasn't aware of his movements? That even if his reach were impeded by dark alleys and blind corners, that there would be no pre-emptive strike? Or perhaps Vayne gives him too much credit - his elder brother is a man of action, far more than thought. Indifferent to strategy, disinterested in subterfuge. That he had not simply entered the throne room with a sword and crossbow is no small surprise.

Perhaps it is their eldest brother who has chosen this path. Vayne wonders what their plan is to deal with each other.

He wonders if they ever even considered inviting him into their confidence. What it was they saw, to convince them otherwise.

The sun is setting, and stretched out on a dock in front of him a group of youths, maybe students - no, not here. More likely journeymen, apprentices to the local trades, or dock workers, or guildsmen - but they are singing to each other, a simple sort of call-and-response, raising glasses and voices high as the sky goes rose and gold. It seems to be a tradition here, to salute the setting sun, and for a moment, with the burning orange line on the horizon, Vayne allows himself to dream a future for himself, here. He could make a good merchant, perhaps, or even join up with a ship, though he'd likely have to start low and work his way to any decent position.

"Your Grace." The man appears at his elbow silently, as the city turns to shades of blue and black, yellow spheres of light along the main streets, a more motley mix of illumination along side streets, disappearing into the shadows. Here to watch Vayne as much as assist him, his father is far too canny for less, would never let him slip from the leash. "It has begun. If you are ready…"

Vayne nudges the bucket with a toe, knocking one of the crabs back onto its comrades. No one has returned in all this time to collect it. He wonders if they will be able to get out by morning, or exhaust themselves to uselessness first.

"I think he looks a bit like my father, don't you? The large, dour one."

"Sir?"

Few people in the world he can have a conversation with in anything but straight lines, and the royal guard doubly so. It could be worse, of course. His father could have sent a Judge. "Sir, are you ready?"

It is necessary - and in this case, Vayne cannot even bring himself to call it an evil. Archadia in the hands of his middle brother would be undone before his reign had lasted a year. Surely, the man would accept nothing less than total war with Rozarria, would not stop until they had been crushed, no matter if nothing remained of his own empire by the end of it. He could not be allowed even the chance to rule, and this move, this secret attempt to build his own army had sealed his fate.

Vayne steps back, extends an arm toward the street. "Lead the way."

The slums beneath Archades had been the best of training grounds, a pair of cheap clothes and a roll in the dirt and Vayne had found his way to many places he was sure his instructors and certainly his guards had rather he never knew of. A light step and a patient ear had taught him more than a thousand social treatises, a coin in the right hand, or just a sympathetic grunt and he'd heard stories, advice, news of the street and the world, even the rumors of value, teaching him of human nature if not of the world. On one occasion, a fight had broken out in front of him, between one man who'd blamed House Solidor for all the ills of Ivalice, and another who had praised them, for victories and gains Vayne knew his father had neither intended nor recognized.

A world as worthy as any other, and perhaps more true to itself, most of the violence refreshingly out in the open. The back alleys, the gaming rooms and whorehouses, and though it suited his brother's coarse nature far more than Vayne's own, his brother did not respect it, or learn a thing from where he walked, counting on his temper and skill with the blade to chart his path. Which meant Vayne knew where and how to spread the rumor that the Emperor's son had hidden himself in Balfonheim, raising an army against the Emperor himself, with a substantial amount of the Emperor's gil as cash in hand.

Easy for the taking, enough to be worth the risk.

The building is quiet, by the time he arrives, though Vayne passed by a few wide-eyed shadows in the alleys, this level of excitement more than even these back alleys are used to seeing. He stops at the entrance, holds up a hand.

"Sir?"

"If I don't return, the Emperor may wish to renegotiate terms with his remaining son."

The aftermath of a bloodbath, stepping past the body half-sprawled in the doorway, the lingering haze of magic stinging at Vayne's eyes. More bodies are sprawled all around the room, blood smeared across the wreckage of tables and chairs, a few sconces remaining on the wall and tables to settle a dim, sick pallor over the rest. His brother had not gone down without a fight.

"… y-you?"

No, his brother had not yet gone down. Bleeding from a deep wound in the gut, dark red seeping around his fingers, but on his feet and very much alive. Just enough brightness in the room, to see the anger warring with disbelief in his eyes. Until this moment, Vayne has been the bookish little brother, and if he was smart it was only enough to know to stay out of the way.

"Which one of them was your healer?" It's unseemly for Archadian nobles to handle their own magic, and Vayne's people are nothing if not unfortunate slaves to fashion.

The expression is more a snarl than a sneer, a feral thing. "You little shit. /You/ did this?"

"You are under arrest for high treason against his Excellency, the Emperor Gramis Gana Solidor." The formalities, no matter how pointless, might as well be followed, lest the whole of civilization unravel in their wake.

His brother barks out a laugh, spitting a gob of blood across the dirty floor, wiping his mouth with the hand that is now red and dripping. "And you, boy, the loyal dog? I was his favorite once, you know. Foolish old man, he plays us against each other, now that we might remove him of the burden of his crown. And his head. You'll be a threat, after this, and he'll kill you too."

He thinks he's being clever, thinks he's keeping Vayne's attention on his words and not the knife he's pulled from some bloodstained fold of his coat. Vayne smiles with a snideness he's not really feeling. He knows for certain, that if he'd shown the barest sign of being a threat before now, that blade would have had his throat before the man had ever left Archades.

"You forget yourself, brother. After this, I will be the sole heir to the throne. Unless he intends to live forever, our father can't get rid of me."

It is a matter of luck, of choosing the right way to move and his brother's injury hindering his throw just slightly, or the knife would have found his eye rather than hissing past him and into a post near the far wall. His brother bellows like a Archaeosaur, charges with both arms extended, more than happy to condemn himself if it means he can die with his hands around his little brother's throat.

He is slow. He is wounded. In his rage, he forgets all sense of logic or reason or that Vayne's sword is two inches longer than the reach of his arms, or that he's already removed what protection he did have, to have any hope of dressing his wounds. A small distance, but the blade has pierced his chest by the time his fingertips brush against Vayne's collarbone, and the momentum is more than great enough to send him fully onto the blade. Vayne thrown back a step with the impact, smelling sweat and blood and what was probably the drink his brother had been enjoying, before the night came to its sudden end. He is eye to eye with his brother - they look nothing alike, really, his brother taking after some distant, amber-haired uncle who was either poisoned or pushed out of an airship. Vayne can never quite remember which.

A good deal of blood pours past his lips, and whatever his brother says, whether a curse or a prayer or simply Vayne's name, is lost as his disbelieving gaze goes glassy, and they go inelegantly down to the floor together, Vayne on one knee and twisting the body away from him, pulling his sword free. He is breathing hard, panting, far more than the situation requires - and looks up to see his father's man standing in the doorway.

It is one form of evidence, though not enough. Never really enough, the rules and requirements of kinship in House Solidor a insubstantial and ever-changing obligation. Vayne reaches in his pocket, draws out a small handkerchief, and kneels down. The floor isn't even, his brother's blood flowing away toward a low spot, pooling along the seams of the boards, and Vayne wraps the cloth around the signet ring on his brother's hand, the seal of House Solidor.

As true a proof of his loyalty as he can carry with him back to Archades. Let the rats have what remains.

* * *

"Sir. Lord Vayne, the Kjata is in view."

He has not slept since leaving Balfonheim, and with dawn approaching they have nearly reached Bujerba. Vayne's eldest brother - his only brother - is not one for running, or games.

If he had asked. If he had but asked, Vayne Solidor might be gone forever and some clerk, some ship's pilot in his place. It never served them, to have much in the way of family ties, but he remembers his brother's voice, strong and deep and distant, towering over him from some great height. A sense of some kind of safety, dim and distant enough for nostalgia. Out of the corner of his eye, the shadow of his father's man. No doubt more of them are within the crew, judging his movements, any hesitation. No test yet that Vayne has not passed, from his father or his tutors or the world, not that they seem to want much but obedience, to act and keep acting, as if such relentlessness is its own excuse.

"Good morning, brother. You're up early."

Archades, so proud of its civility, the layers of etiquette and social demand. A strength, a weapon, a crutch, a veneer beneath a surface so cracked that only the falsehood remains, to hold the shape.

He probably should have tried a bit harder to sleep on the way here.

"Good morning. I hope that the day has found you well."

"Better than some." The transmission takes the warmth out of his brother's voice, or perhaps Vayne is remembering what he wishes, and it was never really there. Instead, there is only distance, the space between their ships and who knows how much more. Years. He might as well be a stranger. "I've heard news from Balfonheim. It seems our brother may have run across some poor company."

"Oh? Nothing he can't handle, I'm sure."

The ring is in his pocket, Vayne can feel it pressing, heavy against his thigh. It remains to be seen, if the body will ever be discovered. No doubt sunk into the bay at this very moment, and Vayne can imagine it, the gentle sway of his brother's body in the darkness, far beneath the waves, and the play of light across the surface of the sea. "I suppose you are right."

His brother knows, what has happened and what this is now. Beneath a deep and focused calm, Vayne's nerves are singing, waiting for the shout, the first attack. The crew knows no more than they must, but Vayne will win this, no question, it is simply a matter of how many moves it takes. Unfortunate, if he retreats to Bujerba. Although, if he has allies there, they seem content at the moment to see how things will resolve before committing themselves to action.

Vayne swallows, his throat feels tight but his voice is steady as ever. "Our father would like a word with you."

Here is where it happens. The fight, and his finger imperceptibly shifts to the controls, ready with shields and weapons. He is an adequate pilot, enough to likely survive this. Until his brother's Bujerbian allies blast him out of the sky.

"All right, then. Let us go."

Vayne closes his eyes, letting out a slow, silent breath. He would have much preferred the firefight.

"-Sir! We have a problem!" The panicked voice is tinny and small, coming across from the Kjata, from the technician Vayne knows has just run onto the bridge, interrupting his brother's order to lay in a course for home. It is difficult to make out the words, through a burst of sudden static, but Vayne knows what he will say. A sudden spike of energy in the engines - a crew of thirty at least, aboard that ship, most of them as yet unaware of his brother's intended coup - and they're trying to get it under control, but they won't. It is a fatal flaw, they will realize that soon enough.

A careful bit of sabotage, before he'd ever left for Balfonheim. Insurance against tribunals, or investigations of treason. No meddling by the idiotic, self-righteous Senate in House business. It has been the law even among the most homicidal of his relations, for centuries - keep it in the family. Vayne does not dig his fingers into the armrest, allows only the barest hint of worry in his voice, only that of the concerned sibling.

"Is everything all right? Do you need our assistance?"

Barely a memory, of trees and sunlight and a large hand holding his, singing some old Archadian song in that booming voice. His brother may have been a fine ruler of Archadia. Who was to tell?

"Lord Vayne, the Kjata's readings… it may not be safe…"

"Hold your position."

A laugh comes across the ether, and in the background Vayne can hear shouting, what sounds like metal giving way, alarms ringing. Surprising that he can hear the laugh, but he does, as if asking him who his bit of theatre is for. It suits no one.

The Kjata turns to face them, even as he can see the flickers of light, dangerous and growing near the rear engine. A tall figure stands near the forward window, long dark hair – just a little bit wavy, like his, like their mother's.

"It seems that you are the rightful heir of House Solidor. Heaven help you, little brother."

A salute, a flick of his fingers, and then the Kjata is rising, growing brighter as it lifts into the sky, and Vayne doesn't turn away. Keeps looking, as the crew around him braces for the blast, shifting to avoid hitting the shockwave at broadside, and he doesn't know what he's feeling, all his clever words only useful for other people.

Doesn't know, as they're flying away, as he returns to Archades as the Emperor's sole remaining son, why his brother didn't just steer his ship straight ahead, take them both out, at least that some sort of victory, a final snub against their father. Why he has been left behind, to blink away the afterimage of the Kjata's firey wreckage falling to earth, and return home victorious.

* * *

Vayne steps into the nursery, everything quiet, the wind pushing a bit at the curtains at the far side of the room. A nurse sits next to the cradle, and her eyes widen when she sees him, one hand rising toward her mouth as if to stifle a scream, though her voice is barely a whisper.

"No. No, please."

The child's mother, Vayne's stepmother, had been terrified of him all her life, even more so when she learned she was pregnant with the Emperor's child. Vayne has heard all the rumors, her poor health due to mysterious interference, even a near miscarriage, though he remembers no such thing - and her death, in childbirth, somehow a chosen fate, a martyr for the life of her son.

Larsa Ferrinas Solidor, an unexpected heir to the throne, should any misfortune reach Vayne as it had found his brothers.

"Please, milord. He is no threat to you." He watches the woman's eyes dart around the room, as if she might very well attack him, if she might only find a weapon. Snatch the baby up and run, if he were not such a danger, a monster to keep her locked in place and trembling. It doesn't matter that she has at least a dozen years on him, and an inch or two in height. He has become far more than he is, and everyone seems to know what he will do and think before he does.

"Leave us."

"Oh… oh no, you can't... please, your grace. Please, show mercy." The woman seems ready to fall to her knees, to prostrate herself at his feet, but her courage fails her as Vayne takes another step forward, and she retreats, all but running from the room. He waits until he can no longer hear her footsteps, and takes the final step toward the cradle, looking down on his brother for the first time.

A shock of dark hair, hands clenched tightly in slumber, and then as if he senses he is being watched, small, blue-gray eyes slowly open, looking up at him with such a serious, sober expression that Vayne can't help but smile.

"Truly, you are my brother."

Until this moment, he was not quite sure what his course of action would be, or if there would be one at all - but now there is no question. It is terrible, how certain he is. Vayne is not at all at ease with infants, has never held actually one before, but he is familiar with the concept of being cautious, and his brother doesn't seem to mind being handled like a particularly volatile piece of magic. Content to continue staring up at him, legs kicking out now and then but mostly still and quiet. So warm, so fragile - it is like holding pure potential, he has wielded spells far less breathtaking than this. Vayne keeps his brother close to his chest, where he won't be jostled, where he will feel safe.

He moves to the door, to the balcony outside. A good thing the nurse ran, this would certainly stop her heart. As if it would take so grand or mad a gesture as flinging the boy to his death. As if he could not do it today or tomorrow, next week, in a year. Larsa's life is in Vayne's hands, literally now, and from this moment on it always will be so.

"If only you knew what you've gotten yourself into." A tiny hand reaches out, grabs hold of a strand of his hair.

"Do you see it?" Vayne gestures gently with his free hand, toward the open sky, the airships floating past, at enough of a distance to be as silent as clouds. "All of this is Archadia, everything the sun touches upon, and far more. Our home and empire. It is vast, and grand, and powerful. We move, and the world moves with us."

Difficult to speak, to meet the eyes that gaze up at him without comprehension - and then Larsa, his little brother, smiles at him for the first time, and it's so much worse.

Until now, Vayne has lived a life entirely without fear. No way that he could see to save this world, this empire, barely a way to slow its decay. It hadn't mattered, enough to watch fools' follies with vague interest, enjoy a clever move of his own now and then and wait to be swept from the board.

And with this, in this very moment, it is no longer a game.

"You are going to be the best of us, Larsa Solidor." Two hundred years of useless men, and now this boy. What other reason is Vayne as smart as he is, as cunning, if not to raise an Emperor that might make something worthy of their House, of Archades and the world? Wise and kind and just - untainted, with no blood on his hands? Surely, if Vayne is worth anything, he can see to that.

"I will be there, little brother, I will help you to become the ruler this empire needs, and when that day arrives, when you are ready, I swear to you that I will make it yours."


	3. stark raving sane

The conjectures on the life and habits of the young Vayne Solidor are endless and widely varied, everything from debauched deviant to bizarre ascetic, and all possible variations in between.

It would amuse those who assumed he dined each day on nothing less than a dozen courses, only the most expensive food for the most discerning palate, to know that one of his preferred meals was cleaning up whatever remained on Cid's plate, the coagulated remains of a dinner picked over while he worked. Absolutely no one's idea of high cuisine, and flirting with inedibility by the hour His Excellency might come along to scoop up the plate. Cid had stared at him that first meal, Vayne taking his time with an unremarkable beef stew, soaking up every crumb with a piece of bread the scientist hadn't touched, and staring back, utterly nonplussed as he chewed.

"That… is highly unsanitary."

Vayne shrugged. "I don't know, I think you make an excellent poison tester."

After that, it was mostly a matter of taking two bowls whenever he knew Vayne was in Archades, and likely to visit. Usually no less than twice in a fortnight, and often lingering into the late hours. In his final years at university, Cid had kept a cot in the back office - more a storage space half-cleared than anything truly habitable. Simply easier to keep working until his fingers refused to keep up with his brain, and the closer he was to his lab in the morning, the less likely he would lose all his train of thought in the hours he was forced to spend asleep.

Cid has a full bed now, a room with a desk and a shower, equidistant from all the most important places in Draklor. Which means he can keep to his own schedule, his own staff working long hours of their own, but eventually even the most focused of them do call it a night, and he is left alone. Cid works well alone - it's not that he dislikes people, his staff are among the brightest in the world - but he simply loses track of endless swaths of time, caught up in his research with no interruptions. Reverse engineering, to some degree - they are surrounded by the past, the suggestions of some grand, lost era saturate the whole of Ivalice, and every secret he can tease free reveals two more. It is a wonderful time to be alive and learning.

"You're not missing much out there today. Just rain and bad conversation." Vayne throws off a sodden coat, reaches for the plate on the table nearest the door, poking at it with a fork. "Mashed potatoes and… meat. Of a sort. You know, Cid, there are places in this world where the food has actual /flavor/."

He doesn't bother taking his eyes off his work. "Good evening, Vayne."

On occasion, there is little mark of time passing at all, other than visits from Archadia's heir apparent. Vayne stretches out, sighing softly, and rolls his shoulders, the compact mannerisms of a man twice his age. He is out of the classroom and into the world proper, which involves a good deal of sitting in on his father's meetings, attending Senate meetings, and occasionally handling grievances from the outer provinces. Cid knows that beneath any of these simple-sounding tasks lies a endless sea of obligations, favors and alliances and matters of etiquette. No love lost between the Senate and House Solidor, and the Emperor is not about to measure out power, even to his own son, in more than carefully measured amounts.

Ffamran, Cid's own son, is excelling now in his mid-level classes, a rising star amongst his fellow pupils, gifted academically and athletically and and Cid can only assume socially as well, considering the notes that pile up at his door, irate fathers demanding satisfaction for their daughters' honor. He has walked with his son in town, on rare occasion, and has seen more than one of these girls rush up say their hellos. Quite pleased with the state of their honor, if their smiles and curtsies and giggles are anything to measure by.

His son is a young man now, preparing for his own life and future, and Cid tries to tell himself that is what marks the distance between them, the impatient way he seems only to want the end of Cid's advice. The fixed expression he gets, nearly all the time they are together now. He wants to be out in the world, to run wild - there is something pent-up in Ffamran, and Cid cannot reach him - maybe never could - and it seems the only thing he can offer now is his distance. It is a father's duty - he knows this - to step back, to let go.

It has been whispered already, quiet suggestions that Ffamran would make a fine Judge. Almost unheard of at such a young age, but he is exceptional and charismatic, and his father is well situated with the Emperor, has served him well. An exalted position, with nearly unlimited possibilities for advancement. At the very least, he would be able to get out of Archades, and be free to make his mark on Ivalice.

Despite his complaints, Vayne has taken up a plate, shoveling the food down in an thoroughly indecorous manner as he paces slowly back and forth across the lab, in front of what seems as much an enormous sculpture as anything, the outer chambers and inner workings of what will one day be the new engine for the Shiva, one of their lighter-class airships. The term only works as a matter of comparison, the idea that such a massive thing will someday fly nothing less than delightfully audacious.

Cid married the only thing in this world more beautiful than an airship. He has loved them perhaps from his first days in the crib, a paper mobile of the Empire's most impressive models spinning above him through those formative years. Breathtakingly elegant, even in their simpler forms. Cid can appreciate their base function as reliable and safe transport, the smoothness with which the world turns beneath them, but in the hands - or paws - of the right designer, an airship is nothing less than a work of perfect art. He has been caught more than once simply staring, a stupid smile on his face, when presented with this - the heart of such a stunning creation, equal to that of any living creature. Cid is in no small esteem from the Moogles on his staff, recognizing a fellow devotee, sharing the belief that no one in any age, in any world will ever create something quite so worthy of admiration.

It has been a while, since last they spoke, though Cid would have to check a calendar to be exactly sure of the days.

"How fares your brother?"

Little Larsa, who follows in Vayne's footsteps like a chocobo with its chick trailing behind. Adored wherever he goes, by all who are fortunate enough to meet him. Shockingly well-mannered, he even comes to the lab now and again, and though he doesn't seem as intrigued about science as his elder brother, he is just as intent to listen to anything Cid wishes to tell him, and quite happy to bear witness to any experiment that promises to produce an interesting result. Or explode, though everyone likes to show up for that.

All praise on their youngest lord is glowing, and even the coarser critiques, the private asides are crude but similar - it seemed that somehow, House Solidor had managed to birth an heir who was actually /human/, and not simply a reasonable facsimile.

"Quite well. He sends his regards. I will have to bring him by, before you finish your work here. He would very much like to see this."

It is, if not the preferred intrigue of court, certainly one of the most long-running - what will be the boy's fate? Larsa's birth was practically a scandal on its own, Gramis past what most would consider his prime, though any of those whispered questions swiftly gave way to concerns of a bloodier nature - how would Vayne, so recently all but ensured his ascension, deal with such an intrusion? Every inquiry gave way to a different answer - he would do it when the boy was old enough to walk, or run, or he was attempting to find a scapegoat for the deed, or he was truly indifferent to his brother, too young to be of any real harm. That view had become less likely, as Larsa had grown and proven himself popular among the people, no arrogance or cruelty in him at all.

The common theory now, that either Vayne has brainwashed his brother, commanding his loyalty through lies and manipulations, reducing him to little more than a kindly puppet, or that he is merely biding his time, prepared to kill the boy whenever he becomes inconvenient. Cid has never considered himself a particularly perceptive man, when it comes to dealing with people, is certainly not an optimist, when it comes to human nature. Still, it was hardly a coincidence, say, that as soon as Larsa was making his first steps into court life, Vayne had taken to saber fencing in the outdoor ring, proving his easy strength, speed and reach with a blade to any interested passerby.

Life in the court is a matter of public theatre, always, and there Vayne has made his sentiments quite clear. So clear, in fact, that Cid thinks they might perfectly conceal the reality. In a world where everything has a double meaning, a hidden agenda, what better way to hide than not to hide at all? The lie is that Vayne loves his brother with unswerving loyalty, concealing the truth, that Vayne would happily sacrifice himself, would stand fast against any enemy to keep his brother from harm.

He is nothing but open and generous with Larsa, giving freely of what time he has to call his own, his brother's interests set before all others. Anyone who considered the boy a brainless doll would be amused to hear the arguments Cid has been privy to, everything from historical debates to current discussions of taxes and levies, Larsa quite able to defend himself and his opinions and Vayne often switching sides, just as his little brother is willing to concede the point, ready to argue things back full-circle. Over time Larsa has come to match him, even get the better of him on one or two occasions, and Vayne is as skilled with rhetoric as any man Cid has ever seen.

He teaches his brother everything, not just propaganda, not just the view of Archadia as triumphant ruler-of-all. There are always new instructors, fresh lessons and perspectives, no subject untouchable, even a few on the validity of monarchy and the nation-state, the authority of government and the right to rule that would likely take the Emperor's breath away. Vayne may be raising Larsa with a goal in mind, but it has nothing to do with tractability.

It is pleasant to watch them together, whether locked in debate or with Larsa discussing some interesting part of his day, Vayne content to listen to every word, with the trace of a smile on his face. It is genuine, the affection for his brother, and Cid believes it may be the closest Vayne can get, that he can allow himself to get, to the person he wishes to be.

"I've managed to locate a viera, and persuade her to become his tutor for a time, to teach him a bit about her world."

Viera were difficult to come by in Archades, preferring more open lands and hunting grounds to the confines of the capital, and even when they did visit the city, they did not tend to speak about their pasts or their home. Certainly not to outsiders.  
"Interesting choice."

"Blame the theatre. 'Under the New Green Leaves?'"

Cid nods. "Ffamran's favorite play as a boy. It was the sky pirates he liked best."

"They've just opened their run, and he's seen it three times already. I could hardly tear him away. No actual Viera, just costumes - you should have seen him, when I told him he could speak with a real one."

"I am surprised she agreed, at any price. They are a secretive people."

"It took some doing. At first, I believe she thought I was looking for a concubine."

Cid snorts, and Vayne makes a face.

"You laugh because you didn't see her claws."

No wife or fiance, no mistresses. No lovers at all, of any kind, as far as Cid knows. For all appearances, Vayne is wed to the state, which means the rumors surrounding him are endless, explicit and quite creative. Anything and anyone he stands next to for more than a few moments, he is attached to, along with all number of whispered perversities - and since Vayne has made a noticeable habit of frequenting his lab, it it practically a given that Cid is among them, possibly the current favorite.

It's almost flattering, at his age. He stands up from where he's been hunched over, checking calculations, stretching out the aches in his back, not quite permanently at an off-angle though Cid can feel it coming. Old age is going to be such a waste of time. He should have spent more of his research on turning himself into a brain in a jar. It would have been more useful than dealing with creaking joints and aching muscles.

"I've heard, Cid, that you've decided to go quite mad."

Vayne's tone is mild, but Cid stops - stops breathing - his hand hovering above the spread of his tools. It isn't fair, for this to find him here. The one place he'd always had, to make sense of the world.

Quiet enough, he can hear Vayne shift where he stands. "I'm rather jealous. I've been trying for ages."

"It's not funny, your Grace."

"And you only bother with titles when you're trying to keep your distance." Cid glances back, and any trace of amusement leaves Vayne's eyes. "I've frightened you."

"Was it Ffamran who told you?" Cid does not turn around. He has not seen much of his son, but enough. The boy is very observant. It used to be that the shadow would only speak to him when he was alone, and at a whisper - but things have progressed since then, and he has not always been able to stop himself. He is a fool, so easily baited by interesting conversation.

"One of your aides, approached me in earnest concern. She says you have been spending more and more time in your private lab below, with research you have little interest in discussing. She says it is unlike you, to be so secretive. And she says… you speak to the air at times, as if conversing with another, but there is no one there. Does your son know about this?"

"I have done my best to be discreet, but…" Cid stops. He can feel his hands tremble, just slightly, and drops them to his sides, and turns. It would be worth anything if Vayne were just a tiny bit less observant.

"I had a colleague once, you know. Just after I'd left university, and he… he lost control of himself. A brilliant man. He was responsible for innovations in airships that have lasted until this day, standard in every single new design. His work was careful, dedicated. No one… there was no great warning. Little things - he became distracted, missed some tests in the lab, left a few garbled messages. I was not one of his close friends, but as far as I know… no one suspected more than overwork. No one knew anything was wrong."

"Cid."

"He used a Firaga, and burnt his wife and children to death in the storage shed behind their house." A part of Cid has been waiting for just such a day, knowing there will be payment demanded, a reckoning for the secrets he's been given. "He said they weren't his family, that they were just some old bones. I… I visited once, after they took him away. He needed to be locked up, of course, but… they didn't know what to do. The doctors. How to help him. So they… tried things, and at the end of the day, they put back whatever was left of him, to try again the next. At times, he even remembered what he had done. Better to be insane, wouldn't it be, than remember? It was terrible. A mind like that."

Vayne looks back, arms loosely crossed, obviously not at all disturbed by the thought he's talking to a madman, with several large pieces of dangerous machinery in an easy arm's reach. What must he have lived through already, to be so calm?

"Will you talk to me, doctor? I am not well in the habit of betraying my friends. Or I wouldn't be, if I had any."

It makes him chuckle despite himself. Vayne is not so much older than his own son, and yet it's nearly impossible not to address him as a contemporary, and not at all due to his station. Cid has met plenty of men with titles and lineages who are most productive when they're blocking drafts, or holding open doors. No reason for Vayne to be here at all, to be concerned over him. He ought to be out looking for a replacement, or assigning an aide to the task, surely a hundred scientists near his caliber who'd jump at the chance.

No reason the boy should be here at all. The heir to the entire damn empire, spending his free time with a lunatic fool who tinkers in the dark?

At the other side of the room, a shadow appears, slowly but inexorably coalescing into a figure, and Cid feels his mouth go dry, shuts his eyes.

_**Tell him.**_

"Cid? What do you see?" Gods, Vayne actually sounds _curious_.

**_Tell him what you've learned. What I've shown you._**

"Go away." He hisses, helplessly, knowing that it won't work, feeling that thing still lingering, watching and waiting and ever so patient. It has a name. It knows secrets, things about the world and the past, but how can he know for sure? How can he tell, just because he thinks he's discovered something, because he thinks he can hold the proof in his hand?

"You need to trust someone." Vayne has stepped right up to him, not quite touching, but close. When Cid opens his eyes, Vayne is there, his gaze intent, studying him so close that it's amazing the boy can't already tell everything, isn't calling for some guard to drag him away. "Otherwise, you might as well go mad."

It is a voice that knows, what it means to stand alone. It is an offer. He has had many conversations with Vayne in this room, sharing confidential information and what have to be state secrets, things no one but the Emperor likely ought to hear. The boy knows more about his life and work than anyone else - if Cid had to name a friend, not simply a colleague - who else? But this is more, possibly the most important… and it is dangerous. It is the point on which everything in his life rests, and he is afraid.

If he is wrong-

"Ask me."

"What?"

"Anything." Vayne holds his gaze, standing so close there's no room for phantoms or gods, as if he could keep madness away by pure force of will.

"You murdered your brothers."

A twin tragedy, so close together, one brother murdered by pirates he had been foolish enough to treat as allies, another dying in a shipwreck, right in front of Vayne's eyes. So many rumors, so much speculation, the overwhelming final consensus that it was House Solidor and at least there was still an heir and it did no good to look too close.

Vayne smiles, and his eyes are bitter and dark, because he already knew this was what it would be. "A waste of a perfectly good question, don't you th-."

"You did it on your father's order."

The bitterness fades into an instant of surprise. It is one thing to recognize a struggle for power that turned bloody, a nasty bit of House business - far another to accuse an Emperor of filicide-by-proxy. Always ambiguous, Gramis never giving away any more than he has to, nothing that might serve to tarnish his name. He has never even publicly supported Vayne as his heir, as one with any right to rule, let alone that he honorably served the Empire by dispatching his treasonous brothers. By using this son as his weapon, Gramis rendered him dangerous - perhaps dangerous enough to be dealt with in the future, if he himself should prove disloyal.

Yet it is the look on Vayne's face that decides it, the surprise there, that it matters - that anyone bothers to mark the difference between father and son, man and Empire. It matters to Cid whether it was his choice or not, and that is obviously not what Vayne expected. Cid he checks the impulse to reach for the boy, to give him a hug - reassurance and support, the way he'd done for his own son, what seems like a lifetime ago.

"All right. I will show you what I've been working on - and then… then you can tell me what happens next."

* * *

It is teardrop-shaped, though still rough and unpolished, and Vayne holds it between three fingers, like the setting of a precious stone, gazing in rapt fascination at the laboratory lights through its bottle-glass depths.

Nethicite. A literal gift of the gods, mythical and long-lost and now here, right in their hands. An amusing thing - if anything about this were amusing - that though the process is exacting, and dangerous, it isn't really all that difficult. Cid still feels exhilarated at the thought of it, even if it comes from a formula not at all of his own devising, even if it has cost him his sanity to achieve such a feat.

Vayne is pouring power into it, an occasional flicker of orange light between his palm and the base of the stone, but otherwise no outward change, the Nethicite absorbing all the magic he can throw at it without the slightest alteration.

"This changes everything." Vayne says softly. "Everything."

"Jagd-resistant airships. I'm almost certain of it, I just have to calculate the balances, and get a few second opinions from the Moogles, since… I think I may even be able to surprise them, this time. It… it just seemed silly to bother, if it was all just a delusion."

Cid wonders if he will come to regret this moment, the feeling of relief and victory, that he had not simply lost his mind. Of course, he knows Vayne was not thinking of its practical applications.

"I cannot keep this from the Emperor. My father will discover it. I am surprised he hasn't already." Vayne relaxes his hand, lets it fall, only to catch it up again, a snap of his hand that is almost frustration. His eyes are on some far horizon, already calculating. "If it were only this, but when have we ever been so lucky…" He looks up, a bitter, amused smile on his face. "What else does he say, this… unusual friend of yours?"

That it means war, Vayne. War with the gods themselves, and this Venat, for all his knowledge, this phantom has been quite reticent as to their chances of victory.

"What do you know of the Dynast-King?"


	4. all we have to go on

It is a Very Serious Meeting.

Judge Bunansa, whose name would be permanently stricken from the record as ever having anything to do with that exalted position, had wildly abused his authority as a Judge to a most odious and dishonorable end, degrading himself to the level of a common thief, and had abandoned all honor in a blatant act of treason, stealing a rare and valuable prototype airship and disappearing without a word of explanation.

It is a theft from the heart of the Empire itself, an insult to the Emperor himself, and Cid is very sober and very pale very early the next morning, standing before three Judges and two Judge Magisters and answering every question either yes, your Grace or no, your Grace.

My most humble apologies, your Eminence.

Ffamran gave no word, no clue as to reason for this inexplicable disgrace.

I could never imagine my son would shame our family name so.

The security of every ship hanger, every laboratory, even the Draklor, is immediately up for heavy review and reconsideration. Cid's own loyalty is not quite called into question, only the spotless nature of his lifetime of service rendering his failure as a father deeply regrettable but not quite worthy of formal rebuke.

It lasts for a Very Long Time. The Judges are without question the very lynchpin of House Solidor, if not the Empire itself, and though it is perfectly expected that one or two of them in a generation might try to slaughter the Imperial family and gain the throne, there is a wide and respectable chasm between perfectly civilized betrayal and utter anarchy. Ffamran Mied Bunansa, whose name is no longer to be spoken aloud anywhere within the court, has betrayed the rules of honor that fall back to the very foundation of the Empire.

At the end, when everything there is to say has been said at least twice, Cid rises from where he has been kneeling in front of the Imperial throne. Shuffling more than a little stiffly, he retreats like a well-whipped animal, taking the punishment for a son who is now as good as dead in the eyes of the Empire. Vayne Solidor falls into step behind him as he leaves the room, his expression grim, no doubt to continue the tirade in softer, more threatening terms in private. Perhaps even to begin the interrogation, to recover the YPA-G847 and her rebel crew as swiftly as is possible. A silent procession of two, all the way to Draklor, to the empty hanger where the very ship should still have been docked, in preparation for its disassembly.

Cid isn't sure who loses their composure first, but all it takes is a single snort, and within moments they are both cackling like drunken chocobos, Vayne bracing himself against the table with an arm pressed against his side. Cid would take better note of it, his liege rarely one for smiling, let alone helpless mirth, but it's difficult to see past the tears of hilarity spattering his glasses, and he laughs like a man possessed, until his lungs ache. After a very long moment, Vayne is the first one to get himself under control, wiping at his own eyes, letting out a sigh.

"He took the moogles too, didn't he."

It sets them both off again, giggling like naughty schoolboys, the sense of victory and rebellious zeal palpable in the air. It makes him feel young again, strangely no less satisfying so even though Cid knows it was an act against him, as much as anyone. He finally comes back to earth with that thought, his son would not likely enjoy the entertainment he's providing.

He has no son, not anymore. Imperial decree. No one to inherit. No one to pass on his name. If Ffamran dies out there, in some distant land, Cid will not even have rights to the body.

"Sky piracy." Vayne says, with something very close to respect. "You would think I would have thought of that."

Cid shakes his head. "You would have picked a better ship. Though, the way they acted, you would have thought he took the Leviathan for a joyride."

"I hear Judge Ghis was going to snap it up at a discount - he wished to give it as a present to one of his mistresses." Vayne tries, and fails, to stop a snicker. "You can see why this might have upset him. He needs all his bargaining chips."

Strange, to think that he could be so amused, that this could be anything like relief, after months of his terribly unhappy child chafing at his duties, and Cid helpless to offer any alternative. His son saw the position for the leash that it was, Cid knows that now, not as an honor but a tightening loop of courtly duties and fealties and politics. A part of growing up, one Cid has always pretended to ignore, hiding in whatever lab will have him, long accustomed to the tedious nature of such business, the compromises one makes with one's own desires and dreams, in the hopes of eventual forward progress. Vayne, enmeshed in such things far further than even he will ever be, has come to make a game of it - it is impossible to stay unsullied, and still have any utility or power within the court, but he has been savvy enough to at least make them work for it.

Ffamran' last words had been a month's worth of tirades, outraged over the gross injustices perpetrated by this Judge or that, the random petty cruelties, the hazing he'd been subject to, as one of the youngest on record. Indignant at the intricacies of law that always seemed to fall on the side of the most powerful, the ones who already had more than they knew what to do with. Disbelief, that no one seemed to know or care that they edged ever closer to war with Rozarria, that he'd heard Bergan laughing - laughing - over how long it would take for all those in between to pack up their cities whole and scurry for cover.

And he'd waited, then, argued himself silent and waited for Cid to fail him for the final time. A challenge, as if it wasn't already somehow all his fault, as if the very first dual-core airship, nethicite and magicite, that had flown from Archades had not sparked an arms race that seemed only able to end in disaster.

As if there wasn't an increased guard now around the labs - and him - and as if Cid hadn't spent hours already defending his research staff to the Judges after the first few leaks, the suggestion that Rozarria had started in on a formula of their own. Impossible to keep such a thing from the world for long, not with the sort of money those merchant-kings could afford to throw down to insure it, not when this had been built up by both sides into nothing less than a fight for their very survival. Five years, Cid gives Rozarria five years before they have it perfected, another year to process all the raw materials - and here was his son still waiting. Wanting to save the world, full of youthful, self-righteous fury with his father lost in unethical, cowardly mediocrity, in helplessness, in madness.

The Emperor knows. The Emperor knows the secret King Raminas has been hiding, and instead of checking his ambitions it has made him only that much more eager to pursue the shards, perhaps to reach for the Sun-Cryst itself, now that there is proof it is more than a fairy tale, some ancient weapon long gone to seed. Cid has known the Emperor at some level, nearly all of his life, and though he cannot say he has ever truly known the man, it never seemed that he would be quite this foolish, that old age would leave him grasping so desperately for any sort of immortality.

Cid had gone in good faith, foolish now, he sees that - but already there had been questions about his research, about his _results_ and it was either give up some of what he knew willingly, or betray it all in the halls of some forgotten dungeon. He holds no illusions about any kind of invulnerability or immunity due to rank or position. It is a choice, to stand by Vayne, though he could hardly imagine doing otherwise, and there are consequences and repercussions and certainly those within the court who would very much like to see him disappear.

"You knew it, didn't you. You knew all along, exactly where this was going." His son had been in full armor, that last time, voice echoing strangely behind the metal plate, as merciless an arbitrator as any Judge could be. "You mad bastard, it will be war. Will it be enough for you, then? War with Nabradia? With Dalmasca?"

Cid regrets it now, his last words, the last fight in a house he rarely occupied anymore, though it was perhaps the most honest he could have been. Ffamran did not want to hear excuses, that he did not particularly wish war with anyone, but there was no undoing what he had uncovered - or that a far greater danger lay in wait, and that they could not simply stand back and hope for it to sleep undiscovered. That even without it, the Judges would still be Judges and men would still be men, and tensions between Archadia and Rozarria must come to some sort of head, eventually. Ffamran did not wish to be patient, to be told he was only one man - the gods themselves only knew how Cid had managed to raise such an idealist.

"You are mistaken. It takes two sides to have a war."

Nabradia? Dalmasca? It will be a slaughter, there is no question of that, and it is inevitable, and that is why his son's final answer was his helm, torn free and flung across the room to shatter against the mirror on the far side, accompanied by a wordless roar of rage that seemed to hang in the air, long after he had gone.

When had he decided, when had Ffamran chosen that particular ship as his chance for escape? The YPA-G847 had issues - beautifully made and expertly built, not one of Cid's designs but truly marvelous, unique - but there were definite problems that had kept it mostly on the ground, more of an intellectual puzzle than a useful machine. Cid had not seen it before it was mostly complete, wishes he had the chance to witness its construction, a truly original design. Ambitious and daring, a garage kit, a hobbyist's dream given leave to grow to full size. Completely irrational, too much of it necessarily bespoke to ever consider bringing it into mass production - and Cid wonders how often his son must have snuck in to work on it, studying its particulars, learning its quirks. The thought of it fills him with pride - his son never bothered being smart when he could be clever, preferring to play the cocksure and careless victor, but at least in airships there is a tie to bind them, one small connection that might last even though he has slipped the door and flown.

There are probably other metaphors to describe all this, than those with caged birds, but Cid is not a poet, and Ffamran has seen fit to make those all too apt.

"He was a terrible Judge," Vayne says fondly. "Just awful. Always making faces at me inside that helmet. I could tell."

Cid had hoped to no purpose, that the two men might one day find some common ground, but it was not to be - he didn't have the ego to think it jealousy, that his son cared who he spent his time with, only that Vayne had no doubt been tainted by association. His son believes him the most terrible of villains, caring only for his work, oblivious to who is hurt or how. Whatever blood is spilled over this - and there will be, there will - as far as Ffamran is concerned, it is all on his hands.

"We'd met, just before he must have - he seemed startled. He must have had the blueprints with him even then."

Vayne stretches back, examining the hanger - the ship not particularly large but by no means unimpressive. His son will have a bit of a time keeping it hidden, though Cid assumes most of the bluff and bluster of the court was meant for him anyway. The best chance they've had in ages, to remind him who his masters are, and what they can do when displeased.

Less and less, really, with Ffamran suddenly rendered nonexistent, and Cid having discovered the greatest scientific achievement of the age, by cribbing notes from imaginary people. At least this will make all his lapses easier, his conversations with no one, the sad ramblings of a man just a little bit broken - and truly, it may be the best of fates for all involved. This business with Venat, it has grown to consume him, and Cid would not have the eyes of jealous gods or emperors straying anywhere near his son. It is better, that Ffamran should not have to fight for a war he does not believe in, a war that may well bring unimaginable ruin - why has Raminas said nothing? He could make some warning gesture, some threat surely, if he indeed held the power to do so.

A hand touches his arm as he passes, to make him pause, and Cid realizes he has been doing nothing of consequence all this time. Staring into space, or fiddling with the tools left, discarded on a table, as if his son had left some secret message there. Pacing, shuffling in circles like an old fool, fussy and uncertain. The concern in Vayne's eyes is almost more than he can bear.

"It's better this way."

He sighs. "I know. He has… this has been a long time coming. It is a good ship, and he is a smart boy. They'll never find him."

Cid will never see his son again.

Vayne's hand tightens, but gently, just enough to remind him. Neither one of them is alone in this.

"There will come a time, I believe, when we will name this day in his honor."

* * *

At first, he takes pains trying to hide it, but as the months pass into years, there are so many better things to damn Cid than a few clippings on a wall, embroidered stories of the latest exploits of a certain infamous sky pirate from an extremely unreliable newspaper, full of purple prose. He calls himself Balthier now, a little esoteric, it took Cid a while to find the play even when he was sure he'd heard the name before - he's kept a few of his son's possessions, most importantly that chapbook, an old copy of the script left dog-eared from reading and re-reading. It isn't a very good play, stuffed to the edges with dramatic entrances, derring-do, romance and treasure and he hopes for all of this, for Ff- for _Balthier_, who seems closer by the day to having all sorts of overwrought nonsense written about him as well.

Cid hopes the plays might even reach the Empire, someday.

"The grand sky-city of Bujerba was set upon at midnight, under the light of the full moon by that charming and notorious rogue known only as Balthier…" Vayne reads by way of his greeting, dropping gracefully into the nearest chair in this, one of Draklor's lower and more well-protected laboratories.

It is all Nethicite now, all the time, and Cid wonders if some of the processes, some of the work he'd done in Magicite is what allowed Venat to speak to him in the first place. It builds up in the blood, the Mist, and though it's been linked, anecdotally, to at least a dozen horrible fates, there's no way to avoid it completely and still work in the field. Cid is as careful as he can be, has had a few technicians complain of headaches or dizziness when handing the Nethicite, but so far there have been no truly ugly surprises.

Venat is… Cid is still not quite certain what Venat is. It does not talk like he would expect a god to talk, more like a fellow scholar than anything holy or wise or even commanding. Offering detailed techniques, explanations on how to create Nethicite, yet utterly silent when he risks the odd question about its endless past, the Occuria it says it has split itself from, or why it has chosen to reveal the truth of what has been lost, simply for the purpose of destroying what seems its own source of power.

In order to build the weapon necessary to destroy the Sun-Cryst, one must learn all the secrets of Nethicite first. It seems a risk, and he had said as much, to entrust any human being to so much power, to assume they would destroy such a weapon. Venat had not answered, not for the longest time, until Cid thought he was once again alone.

_**I needed one with skill, and cleverness, and determination, to see such a thing to its end. I thought once, that I could judge wisdom. I was wrong. I can only tell you what I know, and leave fate to her duties.**_

A god, putting the final judgment in the hands of unknowable destiny - and it does not sound so much ineffable as weary, eternity as a burden, in ways it had not expected. He has made Venat no promises, there have been no vows despite the knowledge it had provided. Such a weapon as the Dynast-King wielded, it would guarantee stability for the Empire, that a young Emperor might rule secure over a second long era of peace and prosperity. Cid knows Vayne thinks along the same lines - though then, the question still remains, with the drums of war sounding louder than ever, how has there been no sign of this power from Dalmasca's king, the inheritance Venat says he still possesses.

**_He knows. He is wise, who understands without seeing. You would use it once._** Venat intoned, unearthy voice oddly flat, as if well-used to having its words understood only when it no longer matters. **_Once, and then you too would see, but then it would be all too late._**

"… accompanied on this daring raid by his… beautiful Viera companion?" Vayne finishes, surprise in his voice. "Well _done_, Balthier. Perhaps I ought change my name."

"He travels with a Viera now? Truly?" Cid looks up, that particular detail enough to be worthy of a break. "'Charming and notorious rogue' eh? Marvelous. He gets it from me, you know. Any pictures?"

"He would be a poor sky pirate if there were." Vayne says. "However, I can tell you there was a particular burglary that was kept out of the public eye, that you might be interested in."

"Anyone we know?"

Vayne is fighting to keep the smile off his face. "Judge Bergan's summer home."

"No. Are you sure?"

"Quite. Cleaned it out from from top to bottom. It will certainly keep him flying for some time, Bergan has expensive taste."

Cid laughs, as he always does when he learns of yet another reckless move, his son's dauntless determination to live to his own romantic ideals. It is the closest he has to freedom, these days. The Emperor's gaze has been on him, heavier than ever these days, with the initial gains of their research with Nethicite not nearly enough, and the greater goal, to discover any of the Shards, having yet to strike fertile ground even with Venat's assistance. He does not know if the Emperor believes him truly mad or simply stalling for time, but he has seen less and less of the rest of his staff as time has passed. Still polite, of course, still professional when testing or relaying results, but wary, unsure - and he can hardly blame them.

"Did he steal that horrible… you know, there was that golden statue… creature." Cid lifts his arms, an approximate gesture of absurd overindulgence. "Antlers. I believe it had antlers."

"Ripped it right out of the garden as they made their escape."

"Spectacular."

His son, the notorious sky pirate Balthier. Cid could not be more proud.


	5. a presumption that our eyes once watered

Lift up any book on the prior ages of the Empire, and turn to any page. Or perhaps not so much those books candidly endorsed by the Senate, detailing which members of House Solidor were lunatics, drunkards, murderers or sodomites - or on very special occasions, all four at once. Vayne often wonders how history will find him, eulogized in some dusty tome ages from now. Dull, no doubt, all the urgency and the passion and the uncertainty recast in the light of retrospect. All events connected, everything tidied up and - win or lose - invariably all for the best. The story of the rise and expansion of the Archadian Empire is a tale of the progress of civilization. Any blood spilled is regrettable but necessary - the way it always is with the unfamiliar dead, those long past with strange customs in strange times, no resemblance at all to friends, neighbors, lovers.

Each generation lives in the timeless now, one it believes will never be history.

The empire has given some small greatness to the world - the advances in airship technology alone have made all kinds of advances possible across the whole of Ivalice, transporting goods and medicines, literacy and culture - even Rozarrian airships run on Archadian principles. Bhujerba owes most of its prosperity, certainly a good deal of its infrastructure to Archades, no matter how much it may complain at present.

Nothing is ever simple, clear or easy until it is over, and then it becomes simply an inevitablity, a thousand viewpoints collapsing into a single, clean truth.

Whatever footnote history chooses to inscribe for him, certainly the announcement that the princess of Dalmasca would wed Nabradia's prince will be remembered as nothing less than tactical suicide from every possible angle. Perhaps marrying one of the ruling princes of Rozarria was out of Dalmasca's reach, but surely there were others, even marriage to a lesser duke would have ensured the country's grudging support, a defense of their borders. An offer had not even been made to Archades, to Vayne - gods, but they were brave. Brave and stubborn and incredibly foolish.

All the alliance had done, as Cid had put it so succinctly, was to expand the playing field to regulation size.

Truly, they have no idea of the storm that is coming. Two little kingdoms with no awareness of how the Empire could grow so hungry for war. Too much pride in the Archadian forces, in their machines and their armies and their might and it had been too long. The Empire was finally feeling its age, no longer expanding as it once had and starting to notice the strain - so it was time to crush whatever presented even the hint of a challenge, to rattle sabers against Rozarria's gates. Folly in the shape of glory and Imperial honor, and all Dalmasca's determined courage would be crushed back to the sand it had been born from.

Or perhaps he is being a bit too harsh on their motives. Rozarria has not exactly been indifferent to the possibility of claiming Nabradia and Dalmasca for their own. It may all be just a matter of who gets there first.

"-a simple issue of compensation, but I can understand your view. I will think about this, thank you."

Vayne glances up from the page, as Larsa comes into the room, tossing a fencer's foil on the couch. No real surprise that he's engaged his teacher in a bit of political discussion - the man gives Vayne a sheepish smile and a slight bow, making his goodbyes - as Larsa talks with everyone, tutors and footmen and the chocobo grooms, and has little issue with them speaking their mind. Whatever today's issue, it has left his little brother rather thoughtful, not at all an unusual occurrence, and Vayne quietly watches Larsa staring into space, elbows on his knees, fingers peaked. At thirteen years old, he has more gravitas than the whole of the Senate together, and even as a younger child he was happy to simply sit and contemplate, observing the world with quiet attention.

It is restful, just to watch him think, such a small thing to be grateful for. Seeing the world through his brother's eyes tends to still the worst of Vayne's fears, makes them quiet for a time. If they do engage the field at Nalbina, and Rozarria responds in kind…

If Raminas presents the Dawn Shard as a gift to the newlyweds… though even that, Vayne suspects, would not be enough to stop his father. Cid seemed puzzled, how little the Emperor had touched upon the Shards in their last interview, seemingly indifferent to their possible discovery when they were capable of so much destruction. Of course, the Emperor was far too smart to show his hand, but it was easy enough for Vayne to imagine. What use, three little trinkets, compared to the promise of the Sun-Cryst? Unlimited, unbound power - and who cared, if it took one of Raithwall's blood to possess it, as the old tales swore it to be? The stories had said Nethicite belonged to the gods alone, and look how that had turned out.

Why bother wondering how the world would remember you, if you never intended to die?

It seems Larsa is not the only one prone to fits of silent reflection, Vayne drawing out of his thoughts to find his brother looking back, eyes glinting with a bit of amusement at catching him so off guard.

"How large is the annual budget of Archades?"

Larsa smiles slightly. It is a common enough greeting, either a question of economics or history - possibly the sciences, if Cid is around to nod approvingly.

"One point nine three trillion gil."

"How much do we spend on defense?"

"Five hundred seventy billion gil."

No use mentioning how much of that goes directly to Draklor. It has become his favorite game, on those days when the Senate forgets to hate him as much as they ought, to go sniping for thousands of gil to pass to the labs, excising it from whichever senator's pet projects he happens to remember at the time. It is like kicking an anthill, even when Vayne doesn't get a single coin, the outraged chaos is entertaining enough to watch.

"Civil engineering?"

"Seven point six billion."

Larsa can do this for hours, comparing lean years with flush, contrasting spending cycles, following the financial patterns that make up so many great conflicts. It does not sit well with him, to reduce the whole of history to the flow of coin, but at least he has learned to check, when a man speaks of grand obligations and moral demands, if at least one hand happens to be reaching for the coffers.

"The Rozarrian national budget?"

"One point eight two trillion gil."

"Style of government?"

"Officially, a monarchy. Unofficially, a collection of mercantile dynasties, currently strongest through the Margrace line."

The Houses of Archadia might enjoy a sordid and long-burning war of quiet hostility, but from what Vayne has seen and heard, the Rozarrian merchant-kings prefer to keep their fangs perpetually sharp on each other's throats, fighting like a pack of crazed worgen beasts.

"If you were to do the most damage with an opening strike, where would you place the vanguard of your fleet?"

"I wouldn't." Larsa says, giving him a tolerant smile at least five years too old for him. It is possible to argue him to the point of admitting that sometimes, war is justified, but it can take past a good quarter of an hour of determined cross-examination, the sort of arguing Vayne usually saves for when the Senators discover some new, unpalatable incursion on their time or - gods forbid - their coin. "You cannot fill a glass once it has been broken."

One of those sage sayings full of empty wisdom that usually reduces Vayne to his best non-expression, but this is Larsa, and he is - as always - fully in earnest.

"What were you speaking of with your instructor?"

Larsa sighs. "A civic issue. The trains wish to expand their lines. Yet it will require some construction in the eastern merchant quarter for some time, and the new depot will permanently disrupt the lives of some of those who currently reside there."

"A case of eminent domain. Surely, they will be compensated."

"You may put a price on bricks and mortar - some of those families have lived three generations there or more. It is their home. It belongs to them."

"Yet…" Vayne leads, because Larsa wouldn't fret if it were so simple as the beleaguered seeking assistance. He'd be petitioning Vayne, and Vayne would be petitioning the Senate, though likely a simple bribe would be far more efficient.

"If the train extends its line, it would be able to reach into a section of the city that has been requesting service for some time. There are few other options, for comparable inroads. It would help those unable to afford sky cabs, and there is a bridge, just before the proposed work, in need of some repair - yet they do not wish to allow the money for it, if the extension does not go through."

And thus his little brother gets his first taste of the joys of bureaucracy. When Vayne feels too optimistic, he relies on the cure of a few hours spent trying to decode the byzantine rules that allow for new commerce and growth within the merchant guilds. All the laws exist, as far as he can tell, entirely to protect the well-established and ensure that any new growth will be as slow, painful and corrupt as possible, but these are powerful men with Senators in their pockets, and he has yet to broach the issue without feeling as if he'd accomplish more by beating his head against the nearest wall.

Larsa frowns. "I am not smart enough at present, to find the answer. There ought be a way, to help all who need it properly. I simply do not know how to discover it."

The boy surprises Vayne at practically every turn. Name the last man to apologize for his failings with frustration at his own stupidity. Name a single one, Vayne can wait.

He considers his answer carefully, as he always does - nothing with Larsa is trivial, that is everything _else_ he must endure in a day. Yet how best to explore this idea, this supposed 'perfect' decision, compared to the simply wise decision, or even the truly foolish one, and all the shades of gray -

The sudden inspiration is, of course, utterly insane, but Vayne's been toying with the idea for some time, one he must commit to while there is still a chance of success. It is rather unheard-of lunacy, but he has come to trust those ideas above the rest. It will do no good for anyone, to pretend at the luxury of conventional choices. Vayne shuffles through his own mental calendar, his day and the rest of his brother's - no binding engagements. No meetings or promised attendances.

"I may know where you might find an answer. Or at least, a better view of the questions."

Larsa is instantly interested, as his lord brother has always made it a habit of helping him find the answers he seeks, bringing him in to whatever meeting or discussion might help him make up his mind. Ignoring those who believe he is too young or naive to benefit from such close proximity - Vayne knows very well, how dearly they long to use Larsa for their own ends. A beautiful young princeling, ready to dance to the Senate's tune. Is is not worth any risk, truly, to ensure his brother remains uncorrupted?

So he agrees without question, follows Vayne to the small room, tucked away at the edge of the palace. It is only when Vayne tosses him the rather threadbare change of clothes and draws his own hair up beneath a stained bandanna that he starts to have an idea of the extent of the plan.

"We… we cannot do this."

"Why not?" Vayne's heart is beating just a little fast - anticipation - and he can't help but smile. So many things he ought to have been, other than what he is. "It is a beautiful day, I doubt it will rain."

Larsa looks down at the ragged vest, back at him, and Vayne has the feeling he's protesting far more because he feels he ought to, than any real sense of outrage. "Rain is.. that's hardly the - it is… it is simply _not done_."

"Exactly why we ought do it. It is early still, we have no waiting business. I have already sent out half a dozen missives, telling everyone that we have gone somewhere other than where we said we'd be. I suspect we are only going to get the one chance at this - today is a good a day as ever."

Larsa looks at him, closely, his voice low and scandalized - and intrigued. "You have done this before."

"It has been a while."

"Why?"

Ask him a question he knows the answer to, let alone one he could answer with any honesty in front of his little brother. Had it begun as boredom or sheer defiance? Refusing to do as he was bid, in whatever small way he might manage. Wanting to see any world, other than the one that had been set before him?

Over time, it has come to be like many other things in Vayne's life, simply the struggle against the unknown, against assumption and convention and fear. Fear was useless, it limited all options down to the easily known. It made men stupid and then it destroyed them, all for the risk of a little information. Vayne would far rather bleed out in some back alley than live in ignorance, forced to endure lie after lie when the truth might prove so easily within reach.

"Before I say any more, you must know this is very dangerous. Promise me now, swear that you will never, ever do this on your own."

"You did. You just _said_ you did!"

"And I'm a fool. Obviously. But my little brother has been born with more sense than the gods gave to fools. So…" Vayne crosses his arms, waiting. Very rarely does he bother to actually wield his power as elder brother, and so after a moment of glaring at him, just so they're both aware of his blatant and ridiculous hypocrisy, Larsa nods.

"I promise." From anyone else, not worth believing. From Larsa, it might as well be writ in blood.

"Right then." Vayne says, attending to the details of his disguise as Larsa swiftly changes into his own. "I will be a merchant who is not particularly skilled at his trade, and you are my apprentice."

"What do we sell?"

Vayne frowns slightly. "This is not supposed to be fun."

Larsa grins back at him, sliding his hand into the tattered remains of a glove. "And yet it is, isn't it?"

* * *

Not particularly difficult to sneak out of the palace, because no one would ever dare bother with such foolishness, let alone see the value in it. The most difficult part is getting out of the very top tiers, though Vayne has a fair grasp of where the various ladders and low walls are, the support systems in place for those who keep Archades running without ever being seen. Once they're down far enough, without guards stationed at every waypoint, it's a bit easier to move around, though Larsa never stops staring, obviously amazed they haven't been caught yet.

As a son of House Solidor, he is familiar, of course, with Archades and all its functions, the tiered system of its daily life, locations of markets and residential districts and universities, though it is a far different thing to read about it in books and study maps as it is to move through the crowded streets of the lower sections, listening to the bustle and the roar of skycabs overhead.

"A bit better than just flying over, I think."

"It's… wonderful."

"Quite. You may, I believe, petition for the chance to visit here more often. It will not be quite the same with a guard, but still tolerable."

Gods, but how he loves the anonymity. Just for a moment, he is not forced to be Vayne Solidor, not a man with obligations and some supposed purpose and a thousand little judgments trailing in his wake, a history he must carry along with him, everywhere. He is no one, just one man of many going about his daily business in the mid-streets, with the movements of the upper circles as mysterious and meaningless as those of the heavens.

"It is a peculiar paradox we exist in, what we are. You will lead, and attempt to do what is right - but you will not be noticed here, by these people, until something goes wrong. If you work to the very best of your ability, the reward is that they do not think about you at all."

Larsa nods. "But that… is all right, isn't it? It is the way it ought be, that they may focus on their own concerns. Or does that mean the people should know more, so that they understand how things work, and are not so ready to jump at shadows?"

Vayne watches a small group of young women at a small stand across the street, comparing the weave of a selection of brightly colored scarves with serious attention. It seems a silly, frivolous thing, because he is not that girl, and his life and future do not depend upon the chance that a pretty ornament might improve the odds of her gaining a rich husband, and perhaps a better life. What does she care for politics, or war? What should she care?

"Tell the people too little, and they are forced to come to their own conclusions. Tell them too much, and they will still not understand every nuance, every implication of a decision, even as they attempt to force your opinion. At times, your principles will be unpopular, due to fear or prejudice - at other times, they may truly be wrong." Vayne glances over, Larsa looking at him with his usual, over-serious expression. "You keep looking at me, as if I have the answers."

He is not his brother's tutor. Larsa has enough of those, to tell him whatever simple truth of the world he might desire. It is not usually meant in malice; simply what is done, especially by those whose livelihoods depend on their recognition as experts. Easier to pick an ideology, a view of what ought be, and conform the world to it, regardless of how well it ultimately works.

"So you expect that I will find them here?"

"Oh gods, not by half." Vayne says, and keeps moving. It takes about two more levels down, before Larsa realizes their final destination.

* * *

"Did you just bribe the guard?"

"Indeed." Vayne has to laugh, just a little, his brother wide-eyed, not quite sure whether to be shocked or indignant. "You don't believe so few outposts could truly keep a secure border with all that lies below? Or that there isn't work above, that those who live there feel is beneath them? It is a rather elegant solution, really. The upper tiers keep their illusion of security, the lower tiers are allowed their mobility and the guards earn some extra coin."

Vayne spends the rest of their descent explaining the concept of gray markets, apparently not something Larsa's teachers had ever deemed suitable for his esteemed ears. A damned shame Balthier wouldn't come within a hundred miles of Archades, he would surely be able to give the boy a proper education.

"… so everyone's lying, and everyone benefits?" He sounds a bit distressed. Disgruntled. Thank the gods, the boy still is not much of a Solidor.

"In one light, it might seem distressing - but people need to eat, to take care of those they love, and if the laws will not allow it - well, far be for a woman to choose her starving child over a code set in place by men she will never meet, for virtues that fill no one's belly. Nobility is a rich man's conceit, not that most of them do well at it, either."

He can practically hear his brother thinking it over. Weighing what he knows and what he thinks is right against what has been learned. Innocence must be forged properly into one's ideals, pragmatism as the hammer and the anvil, if anything useful is to be made of the result.

"If it is the people that need to bend," Larsa says, slowly but with some confidence, "if they cannot bend to a law that does not serve - then the law ought be altered."

"… and the best way to find out what the people need most, is to discover which laws they cannot help but break."

The noise of Old Archades comes first, followed closely by the smell. Just as Vayne remembers it.

"Keep close to me, then." He says, though it's hardly necessary, Larsa's hand clinging tightly to his own. Well aware he is a stranger here, with little power in this vast and decrepit, crumbling world. "No assumptions. No judgments, not yet. I just want you to watch."

A few more steps, the turn of a corner and they are amidst a sea of the unfortunate, the unlucky, even the damned. It is a market district, yet brighter and louder than anything even in the lower levels of the city, and far more temporary, most of the 'shops' little more than pieces of scrap wood covered in trinkets, supplies, anything that can be gathered and certainly more than can only be stolen.

Old Archades is a patchwork place, the aged built upon the ancient built on what is crumbling away. All around are Humes, Seeq and Bangaa at work and play, chatting with each other at tiny, makeshift bars or simply slouched in the shade, waiting to see what the day might bring. Two moogles on a small platform, each dyed in multicolored stripes, seem to be practicing some sort of acrobatic routine, one doing a handstand, balancing on the paw of the other. A little further down the street, a man and a woman are shouting, so many slurs so fast Vayne can't figure out if they're breaking up or arguing over money or about to kill each other. No one else on the street is much interested, walking around and between them without paying any heed, and after a while the woman disappears into what must be her house, slamming the door behind her, as the man takes off down an alley still cursing to himself.

"How many live in Archades proper?"

"Just below five million." Larsa says distractedly, can't begin pick a point to keep his attention fixed, eyes darting everywhere, as overwhelmed as Vayne was the first time he'd come here, plunged anonymous into the chaos. Except it wasn't chaos, still isn't - that is simply the view from above. The very reason they are down here at all.

"No census here, but the estimates are somewhere around three hundred-fifty. It could be as high as five, or eight."

"Eight-hundred-thousand? Living here?" Awe in his voice. For all his kindness, Vayne knows Larsa's never truly thought of them. Or only in the way the rest of the highest-tiers of Archades do, as some unknown mass of bodies lurking in the darkness beneath the city - faceless, anonymous. Strange and best to be avoided, as if even thinking on them too often might conjure up some hidden danger.

"The way that you choose to see them, here, it will say more about how you will live your life than any other decision." Perhaps untrue, were Larsa intended to be anything other than Emperor, that his choices and his viewpoints would determine the lives and livelihood of some one-hundred-twenty million people, stretched across the whole of his Empire, whose lives and needs and opinions might run entirely counter to his own.

A tiny girl runs up to them, hands full of small, blue flowers, her smile bright and desperate. Vayne gives her two gil in exchange for two small bunches, and the girl curtsies once to each of them, darting away, instantly lost in the crowd. Larsa stares after her.

"She was just a child. So small."

"If you put the flowers in your lapel, it will help with the smell."

"Surely we could do something about that."

"The child or the sewers?"

"Both."

Vayne nods.

"Fair enough. This is your task. Today, you may help one person. Just one. I wish for you to put your coin where you believe it will do the most good."

Larsa stares at him for a moment, almost instantly turns back to the crowd, looking for the little girl.

"Give her a fortune, and how will you keep it from being taken from her, the moment your back is turned?"

Larsa bites his lip, nodding slightly, and allows Vayne to lead him further into the fray.

If there is a single great myth of Old Archades amongst the city folk, it is that no one survives here for long, that it is some unknowable cesspool that devours the unwitting whole, and going there is to practically insure one's own destruction. Certainly, there are many ways to end up on the wrong side of a blade, but Vayne has discovered there is a great deal of villainy that has no interest in dealing with outsiders. Though there is no doubt a considerable amount of crime in the streets, there are just as many simply living their lives with little in the way of resources, doing what they can to get by, hoping for a better tomorrow. He sees the surprise on Larsa's face at how much order there is here, passing from one street to another, crowded lanes hung high with laundry stretched between the buildings, and children playing happily along the dusty street. Flowers bloom in window boxes, serious women in sober dresses exchanging the day's news, watching them pass with suspicious eyes.

"I do not think they would want my help, should I even offer it." Larsa said, as soon as they had turned the corner. "It is not… I thought it chaos at first, but it isn't, is it? It is only… people. Little different than the city - perhaps even the court."

He says it as if it sounds audacious, even blasphemous, though Vayne came to much the same conclusion years ago.

Very little actually happens, as they continue through the streets, though the weight of misery here is readily apparent in every tumble-down building, in those who sit helplessly at curbs or at corners, staring into space. A man in a very shabby uniform, missing a leg - an Archadian soldier, and Vayne wonders how many more will come to join him, and how soon. It may be a clear victory over Nabradia, but it will not come without some cost. Larsa's hand rises then, and half a dozen times more, to make his choice, but never quite touches his brother's sleeve. A woman calls to Vayne, from a building painted sloppy bright, red that has faded to orange in the sun. Nearly falling out of both the window and her low-cut blouse, with an offer that leaves Larsa bright red and spluttering.

"Breathe, brother." Vayne murmurs, moving them along. "It would be quite a pain to have to carry you out of here."

"Did you hear what she-" Poor, sheltered Larsa. Vayne's not sure he's even started thinking of girls in any way but how etiquette demands he treat them. Nothing but the most proper behavior, though there is little doubt he would treat whores any differently than duchesses. "How can… I mean, I'd heard of - but she was laughing!"

"I imagine she has little other way to make a living, and has decided to enjoy it as best she can."

Larsa is indignant, and still more than a bit pink. "It ought be outlawed, I would think, for their sake."

Not exactly the conversation he expected to have, but it is as good as any. "Would that truly stop it, or simply remove her from public view, that we might feel good for no longer having to think about what she must do? Send all of them even further into the shadows, where more harm might be done? Strip from her even the thinnest veneer of her humanity?"

It isn't what Larsa wants to hear, but he is also sensible enough to put reason in front of his own ego. No small miracle, that.

"… it still isn't right."

"So, how to resolve it? Shall I make her your beneficiary?"

"No." Larsa says, shaking his head. "Coin alone… won't solve this. Any of this."

Vayne waits, but his brother is not yet interested in sharing his thoughts, and they continue on in a small bubble of silence, past more stalls and more brothels and more buildings boarded up, others that likely should be, with people at every window, sitting and laying on balconies that look as if they might fall over at any moment. A fight, loud voices from inside another bar, and an old man is thrown out, half-stumbling, landing hard in the dirt. Slowly, he sits up, tears rolling down his sunken cheeks - a broken jaw, if Vayne had to guess, and Larsa's hand fists against his sleeve.

"Brother, _please_."

He made the restriction on coin, not on aid, though he should have known better. It is dangerous, to show off what they really are, with the magic to tell exactly where they come from. Very little spellwork done here, no one with the coin to buy even the simplest incantations, and hard penalties even then - no one wants a slum full of pissed-off magic users. It is risky, and hardly necessary - but Larsa is looking at him with pleading eyes and the streets are mostly quiet.

"Be quick about it. Nothing flashy."

Instantly his brother is at the man's side, Vayne strolling up to stand guard a few paces away. He smells as if he's been used to clean out a brewery, bloodshot eyes and gray stubble and probably not as old as circumstances have reduced him to. Larsa's tone is still is quiet, respectful. A small hand against his cheek, the softest glow of green as the spell shimmers against his skin, seeping through to knit the bone, and Vayne pulls his brother up as the drunkard staggers to his feet. Staring at them for a moment before smiling, an expression that turns his face into nothing but soft, craggy lines as he gives Larsa's cheek a gentle pat.

"You're a good boy. A good boy."

Vayne can guess what's coming next, though Larsa's expression is absolutely dumbfounded as the man turns, and goes right back into the bar. He steers his brother away, before the shouting can no doubt begin anew.

* * *

They are crossing the street, in front of a cart serving up bowls of noodles and what smells like extremely questionable meat. It does not seem a coincidence, the few customers seem to be eating mostly vegetables. Halfway down the next block, before Larsa finally turns on him.

"Why did he _do_ that?"

"Why did you help him? It is one and the same. Plus or minus a few gallons of cheap refreshment."

"You _knew_. You knew what he would do." Staring at Vayne as if he is some sort of oracle, a wise mystic from the distant mountains.

Vayne shrugs. "It is not so impossible, to observe the measure of a man, and through that, we may predict his future action. We are all of us many different people, all at once. A man may love his family, but long for glory even more than their affection. A coward might be loyal, and surprise himself with unexpected courage when his loved ones are threatened. In each of us is a singular drive, for good or ill. It may be what is most apparent, or it may lie hidden, waiting for tragedy or opportunity to bring it to the surface."

Larsa looks at him, now curious and challenging. No one else dares look at him like that, not ever. "What is yours?"

"Dinner."

An irritated glare, pure younger sibling now. "You're making fun of me."

"That depends on what is for dinner. I will say, I do not feel quite brave enough to dine down here. Have you made your choice yet, who is most worthy?"

"Far too many, I fear. The further we walk, the more…" Larsa pauses, and sighs heavily. "If this was supposed to help, I have failed to heed the lesson. I do not know what to do."

"How much of Archades' gold did the Senate claim as their own, to give in support to those guilds that support them in return?"

Larsa is not much in the mood to oblige him, yet trusts that Vayne will make this worth his while. "Sixty-eight billion, all total. Spread out across twenty prominent guilds."

"… and how much do you think they will choose to give, to people they have never met, who live in squalor?"

Instantly fierce. A Solidor's temper in his brother, even if it is not provoked in the usual ways. "We cannot choose where we are born."

"Yes, and it is extremely convenient to forget that. It is natural to want to make things simple, to pretend that the world is always and ever in our control. It is frightening for those up there, to imagine themselves one day down here, their /children/ down here, and they do not even know the little that you or I do, that it is not as good as a death sentence."

Larsa is frustrated, trying so hard to solve what most people are content to ignore, honestly and truly concerned for the future of those he hadn't known of hours ago. "So there's no purpose to it, if they will never venture here. We have the means, yet lack the momentum."

"If you wish to help those in need, you must make it attractive to those who don't care."

"How can they not _care_?"

"You're asking the wrong question, and you know it." He keeps his tone light, his brother kicking himself enough already, for not being able to save all the world. "You're a Solidor - focus on what _is_, rather than what ought be."

Larsa makes a fist, biting slightly on a knuckle, weighing his options. Vayne is a politician, has been for all of his life, a mediator and a deal-maker and a consummate liar, when it is necessary. Larsa is something else - a builder, a social architect. He sees possibilities, the promise of better futures where few others can.

"If helping them directly will not do the most good - this is where they live, now. Yet there is no pride in it, because they feel there is no reason to-" He rocks back on his heels, just slightly. "They are people, no different than any other, which means there is talent here that goes unrecognized and unrewarded. If we could… convince the guilds. Start small, find the very best, apprentice them - all for free, if they agreed to help with the infrastructure here as well." He doesn't realize he's already turned this into a speech, gesturing to emphasize the important points. "We can convince them to invest in their own neighborhoods - and they could teach others what they learn. We could educate. In time, it might even be a way to earn their papers, for themselves and for their families. They would no longer feel like strangers in their own land."

Half the Senate will happily shoot down any idea Vayne brings to the table, out of spite against him or his father or some great-great-grand-Solidor who once slept with someone's sister's brother's cousin. It is a testament to his skills, that Vayne manages to secure most of what is important, though there is always the matter of choosing what to sacrifice. Larsa, on the other hand - Larsa is beloved, of the people and the Emperor and perhaps it is his youth or his optimism, that even the Senators see some small, pale shadow of who they once might have been, if there had ever been a single ideal to split between them.

Misplaced pride is irrelevant - his brother knows that already. It blinds, it limits options while offering no reward. The results are what matter, and let them coddle him if they must, give him what he wants as mere indulgence. Heavens know they will not think so little of him when all of Old Archades knows to whom it owes their gratitude. It will work, this small, rough plan, though Vayne can see his brother even now, turning it over in his mind, polishing it down. Easy enough and cheap enough, that the Senate will grant it to him like a gift, hoping to curry Gramis' favor, or simply as an amusement. The Senate has no idea what Larsa is capable of, though Vayne has never doubted him.

Some of what he's thinking must show on his face, and his brother smiles, well satisfied. They continue walking quietly, though Larsa's thoughts are now loud enough that Vayne thinks he could hear them, if only he listened close enough.

He has been paying attention to every person they've passed, shifting them into a simple distinction of harmless passerby or possible trouble. So far, no sign of anyone even giving them more than a single glance, which Vayne credits less with their attire than the insanity of it - for what purpose would a Emperor's sons ever come down here? Still, he does make a grave misstep at the corner, glancing at the man lounging there and seeing no sign of weapons, nothing in his stance where he slouches to suggest at danger. He waits to speak, until Vayne is right next to him. Close enough, the words are soft but clear.

"I'll give you a hundred gil for an hour with the boy."

He does not think about going for the dagger, it is simply there in his hand, pressed against the man's side, barely any space between them with the step Vayne didn't even realize he'd taken. He had not brought his sword with him, the expensive weapon immediately calling attention to his station. The smaller blade is much easier to conceal, and very, very easy to kill with. Vayne has made a point of learning the sort of combat not usually taught to refined young men. The kind that only ends with a body, by the most expedient means possible.

"Easy there. Easy." The man takes two quick steps back, raising his hands high. "I didn't mean nothing by it. Don't want any trouble."

Vayne says nothing, only stares until the man has moved down the street, around the corner and gone. Keeping a measure of him, just in case, just in case. Not quite able to let go of the thought that he ought to make sure…

"What's wrong? Did he say something to you?"

He has come down here to teach his brother a bit more of the world, and yet the world sees fit to remind him of his purpose. Larsa can be who he is, because Vayne is who he must be.

"Just a mistake. He thought I was someone else."

* * *

Time continues to pass, with little in the way of incident. Larsa is in much brighter spirits, occasionally throwing out some question about a facet of his strategy, which guild might be the most interested, who he ought speak to first. He studies the city with a new eye, obviously cataloguing the good he might do, the ugliness around them drained of most of its power to hurt, just another challenge he can rise to meet.

Vayne wonders if those adventurous nobles from the city who come down here for a thrill are disappointed with what they find. Maybe not, unlikely they take any pains to hide what they are or the type of coin they carry. A rather sad end, but just as easy, he supposes, to borrow the most ruthless man here. Wrap him in velvet and drape him in gold, and see how long he would last in the court. The deaths may be quieter at the top of Archades, with slightly more forewarning, but Vayne doubts that truly makes much difference to the corpses.

"Oh."

If he had known where the street they were on would end, Vayne would have taken a different way. Any other way. Yet it has been a few years, in this place where things can change twice in the span of a night, and he does not know it as he used to. It does no good to keep Larsa from the world, to pretend that ignorance is innocence, and yet there are some things Vayne would protect him from, that can do ought else but cause pain.

Larsa has loved chocobos all his short life, learned to race them right along with walking. He has six birds of his own, all purebred beauties - would easily have a dozen more but he doesn't want to neglect any of them for the others. It is a passion, treated with the same attention to detail as the rest of his life. He has learned how to care fully for the birds, followed two in his stable from egg to full-grown racing champion. Vayne is not entirely sure who would win, Larsa with his birds or Cid with his airships, if they were allowed to speak their fill. Likely, it would not end until they'd both talked themselves hoarse, and were too weary to keep gesturing.

Chocobos name the humans they are most familiar with, bringing them into their flock. Vayne's own mount is a gentle black, who greets him with a soft trill and two short clicking sounds, twisting her head to nip playfully at his hair. It is little compared to the fanfare Larsa receives when he visits his own in pasture, a chorus of excited warks and clicks that make up his name, the birds crowding around him, all but trampling each other to gain his attention. Everyone wants Larsa's approval, the birds are simply the most honest about it.

So it is cruel, and nothing else, to turn the corner and find themselves at auction. A most terrible sale, nothing like the proud shows in the upper markets - this is where those chocobos felled by illness or cruelty or the simple passing of too much time have come to die. A few of them are dead already, piled like cordwood in a corner stall, ready to be plucked for pillows or hats, beaks and claws removed and the meat ground into animal feed. Larsa is pale, gaze unreadable, flinching at a bird's scream from some further, dark corner. The air is even fouler here, the smell of death and pain in every breath.

"We should-" Vayne starts, but his brother lifts a hand to stop him. Walks slowly, very carefully amidst the mostly empty hall - all the birds who will leave this place have been purchased already, all that is left are those without hope. Most of the chocobos keep their heads nearly to the floor, too weak or sick to move. It is the inevitable conclusion for the business of raising and riding them. It happens here and elsewhere in Archades, and all throughout the Empire, a sad truth, and Vayne takes no pleasure in seeing it. Larsa, however… this has surely cut his brother to the quick.

A soft sound from one of the stalls, a weak chirp, and his brother turns, lets out a shaking breath. Steps forward to kneel in the muck and filth, reaching out one hand for a chocobo that looks more dead than alive, pressing its head into his hand. Larsa is good with animals, can calm frightened beasts that would snap another man's hand off at the wrist, and Vayne thinks that if the creature were to die right now, it might be in the most peace it had known in its short life.

"Oh, you poor thing. You poor, poor dear." Larsa croons, stroking its feathers, running fingers over the striations in the beak that speak of poor nutrition, and somehow - impossibly - he coaxes it to its feet, looking it over with a expert's eye. Encouraging it to lift a leg, running one gentle finger over the black-tipped claws, more than a few of them cracked and broken.

"It's gone lame, they've pushed it much too hard." Larsa shakes his head, getting angry now, the chocobo resting its head against his shoulder. "Look at the lines of her, and the tail feathers. If they weren't snapped in half, they'd be twice as long, easy. This is a Sunset Gold. It's a runner, a show bird, not meant for pulling carts."

Vayne only sees a filthy bird, exhausted and mite-ridden, with sad, hollow eyes, but if his brother says it is a treasure, then that is what it is. Perhaps once the pet of some high-ranking criminal, tossed away in a moment of bad fortune.

"I'm surprised you got her up off the ground. I could charge you an extra two gil for that." Here, right on time, is the reality of the situation, the painful truth - the man leaning against a nearby pillar is not a monster, even though this cruel business is his trade. He's tall, and lanky, and has a friendly enough smile. "Just a joke, I'm not about to haggle over this mess. You, uh… interested in this one? A shame, not at all in good shape, a wreck by the time they dumped her here. I doubt you'll be able to get it anywhere alive - I could cut her throat for you for a gil, drop the price by three. Or keep it at, say, thirty, and I'll clean her down to the skin. Washing the feathers, if you want, that'll cost you… ten gil extra? Nah, seven. I doubt most of them are worth the effort."

"No!" Larsa says sharply, a protective hand against the feathered neck, but Vayne can see him already doing the swift, cold calculations. He wants very badly to save the bird, but Vayne has given him only the one chance, and a chocobo is not the life of a hume or anyone else, not by any measure. Selfish to use his chance here, yet the bird suffers and if he does nothing…

Vayne counts out the gil, twice the asking price, coins clinking in his hand. "I want you to get her some food, and clean water. Move her to a better stall. I'll send someone by for her, tomorrow at the latest. He'll bring you a fair bonus, if you can keep her alive until then."

"We have finer birds, sir. In far better shape for your coin. I can show you a dozen-"

"I've a bit of a fondness for lost causes. Will this be sufficient?" He passes over the money, knowing it will be, and the man nods, hardly about to argue with the eccentric when it's gil in hand. He gets a bridle on the bird with gentle enough hands, and leads it slowly out of purgatory, back into the land of the living.

Larsa's eyes are shining, full of hero worship and adoration - it has been a while, since Vayne has seen that look, and what he's done does go against the entire point of the exercise, but with Larsa staring at him so, he can't quite bring himself to care.

"But, I didn't…"

Vayne smirks. "I said you had one chance to make good with your coin. I never said anything about myself."

A fierce and grateful hug. The nobles of Archades are not known for grand displays of emotion, even the children learning early the value of reserve and restraint. Thankfully, Larsa is possessed of an occasionally impulsive spirit that no one yet has been able to bring themselves to check. As if Vayne could, even if he ought to know better. He needs to be his brother's hero, though, while there is still time to do it. Vayne knows exactly what he is doing, in constructing an Emperor of the highest moral character. One who questions and reflects and questions again, and who will not accept certain ideas of necessary sacrifice, will not be able to /see/ them as necessary.

He is creating a brother who will, one day, no longer love him.

Important then, to enjoy what he is given, save this moment against what is yet to be.

* * *

Almost a full day, then, of surviving Old Archades unscathed. The sun is starting to go down, and Larsa has perhaps lost track of his original obligation, in between the particulars of his new plan and trying to come up with a name for the chocobo Vayne can only hope will last long enough to be collected, though even after that it may prove too sickly to nurse back to health. Larsa is good with disappointment, however, can bear up to nearly any failing as long as he is given the chance to try.

At first, the sharp crack sounds like a tree splitting down its center, impossible in a place with no trees to speak of, and then Vayne hears shouting, a plume of dust kicking up into the early evening sky, and he is fairly sure of what has happened. Larsa is already moving down the street toward the commotion, and Vayne doubts he will be able to change his mind in time to go elsewhere, easier just to keep at his heels.

Magic is difficult to come by, but that only makes it all the more desirable, a heavy black market trade in all sorts of spellcraft at what are sad prices, only slightly less than what can be obtained by legal means. However, legal means require papers, and without them the only option are spells of dubious translation, half-finished or misspelled or even written up from scratch. At best, a waste of money, and at worst, this - a misfired spell of no small power that has torn through a two-story building already in precarious shape. The crowd keeps their distance from the wreckage, a few people dragging those who can move out of harm's way. A sobbing man is curled over the shape of a woman far gone, by the amount of blood on the ground. Larsa goes to her anyway, eyes darkening as he confirms the worst - looks up, at the sound of more creaking and groaning, and a high-pitched scream from one of the upper windows.

"No!" Vayne snaps, because he already knows what's going to happen, sees the determination in Larsa's eyes, and he lunges as his brother runs forward, snatching the air just behind his collar. The darkness inside the house swallows his brother whole, just as Vayne makes it to the doorway - an ominous creak, the spill of more dust and debris as the wood shudders beneath his hand. Larsa is smaller, light on his feet - to go in would ensure disaster, but Vayne cannot take a single step back, ignores the shouts urging him to get away.

He can barely hear anything, past the sound of his heartbeat in his ears, the world collapsed to a single point of focus and when he hears the building moan again he is casting, fighting to keep the words from rushing together into a useless muddle. The Slow spell buys what can only be moments, magic pulling hard against inexorable gravity, but he can't think past keeping it going, and not stammering over the words. Can't do anything but stare into the dark, and even when he sees movement, even when Larsa comes barreling past him with the tiny, filthy child clinging to him, Vayne can't manage a full thought in response. Just staggers back, and it is not instantaneous, the house does not collapse completely, but a shudder goes up his spine anyway as the roof finally caves in, with a snap of breaking tiles and stone, and the walls of the first floor start to give way.

Larsa is on a knee, and for a painful moment Vayne thinks he is injured, but it is simply a struggle to untangle the girl from her death grip on his shirt. A woman appears, helping to pull her away, thanking Larsa profusely through her tears, but Vayne's already got a hand on his brother's shoulder because more than a few people likely saw the spell he cast, and it would be better if they were moving /now/-

"You! Help me, here!"

A voice cuts through the commotion, authoritative and female, and Vayne is surprised to see some of the wounded being carried off in an fairly orderly fashion. The woman is tall, with dark hair and an oddly imperious grace, striding over to grab his hand, half-dragging him toward the next stretcher.

"Get moving. Quickly." She hisses, and Vayne realizes she's giving them an out, grabs for one end of the makeshift pallet as his brother takes the other, and within moments they are hurrying down a dark alley, following a line of stretchers out of sight of the rest of the crowd.

The building they reach is low and wide and as pieced together as any other in Old Archades, but well lit and surprisingly clean, as they make their way inside to where the other injured have been set down in neat rows. The woman comes last through the door, and by the time Vayne realizes she's quietly dismissing the rest of her staff, they are alone and she is closing up the windows, one by one. Larsa has already gone to the worst of the wounded, the green glow of magic visible even though Vayne is turned away, watching their unexpected rescuer closely. If she hadn't noticed anything before…

"You're very brave or very stupid to be waving around-"

The woman stops. Looks at him very closely, and swears quite vibrantly under her breath.

"What in hell are _you_ - you know what, no. Please don't tell me. I'm better off not knowing." She glances back, to where Larsa has moved on to the next patient, shakes her head again. Keeps a tangible distance from Vayne, as if he's holding something poisonous and ready to strike. "What do you want? You can't possibly… I don't have anything… there's nothing here. Nothing at all."

"We were only passing by. I was… attempting to give my brother a wider view of the world, when we saw the building collapse, and he felt the need to play hero." Larsa looks up at that, and Vayne doesn't bother hiding his displeasure, easier to feel anger than the aftershocks of real fear. Now he knows some of what Cid must have gone through, when his son felt the need to turn innocent airbikes into smoldering, high-speed shrapnel.

"You… you are leaving, then?" A hesitance in her tone, she's shifting her hands nervously, obviously concerned for her patients but not about to take her eyes off him. Vayne realizes what's struck him about her, the way she carries herself, the slight tilt of her chin. Maybe a half-dozen years older than he is, and Vayne searches for a name, a scandal.

"You are noble born. House Laeld? They had a daughter-"

He sees her flinch, and despite her reservations, she moves closer to him. Larsa is curious, but respects her privacy, continuing on with his work. It is quiet enough, those he has not already healed are content to watch him, perhaps some of the first real spell craft they have seen in their lives.

"Yes. I was of that House, long ago. I shamed my family, and they… sent me away."

Even if he didn't know the story, Vayne could guess.

"Did the child survive?"

She squeezes her eyes shut, a moment of pain, and shakes her head. "It doesn't matter. I cannot go back."

"So you stay here, and heal." House Laeld is not much known in this age, despite how quick they were to cast one of their own out in disgrace. A drunken aunt, a middling politician of a great-uncle, and an heir who plays far too loosely, and poorly, at the gambling halls. "You are a credit to them, whether they acknowledge it or not. It is surely their loss."

Vayne has forgotten himself, that he is not anonymous here, that when he speaks to her it is not only in his own name, but as the Emperor's son, and though he cannot restore her title it is fully in his ability - with a few simple words - to restore her honor. Little surprise then, that she breaks down into fierce tears, waving away the cloth Larsa offers, and her smile, when it finally comes, is radiant.

The final few patients are sent on their way - Selista Laeld knows enough, Cure and Sleep and Esuana, to be of great value to the people, her people, when those she believed to love her had proved faithless. It is not possible to stay long, but Larsa speaks a little, of his ideas for improving life in Old Archades and how she might help him - and a new inspiration, possibly subsidizing some magics, white magics at least, for use in the low district. It does not take very long, for her to adore him as much as anyone ever does, curtseying low to both of them as one of her allies appears at the door, to ensure they get safely to the edge of the city.

Vayne has turned to go, when a hand tugs gently at his sleeve.

"The money." Larsa says. "You said I could help one person, to help all. Give it to her."

* * *

It is late, by the time they sneak past the night guard - harder to bribe than those in the daytime, and it's just easier to scale the walls and pull Larsa up behind him, making their way back into the sections of the low city that still seem like palaces, compared to where they've been. Vayne tosses the scarf away, no longer caring if they're caught. Larsa is only just starting to blink a little wearily, all the events of the day finally catching up with him.

He is not nearly so tired, still shaking off the memory of the building, of losing sight of Larsa for what felt like an eternity, a gap in the universe. If he had misjudged, if he had hesitated or the spell had slipped or things had happened in any other fashion - it hardly bore considering, but that did not mean he could stop thinking about it.

Surely, by now there must be guards out searching. It does not encourage Vayne to hurry, and after a while they are standing at one of the balconies, overlooking the greater spread of Old Archades. It appears as if sky and earth have traded places, the lights of Archades blotting out the stars, spilling down constellations onto the world far below.

"It looks beautiful, from up here," Larsa says, and then, "you are angry at me, for what I chose to do."

He has to swallow, to keep his voice calm.

"You greatly underestimate your value to the Empire. What could we have done, had you been killed?"

"Me? But I am not the heir of the House." Larsa is looking at him, closely, but Vayne has a lifetime's worth of experience in giving nothing away, and he keeps his eyes to the horizon.

"We could go."

"Go?"

Walk away. Right now. Keep walking. Steal an airship. Find a boat. Cut his hair, dye it blonde. Take up fishing. Live as one of those distant strangers, to whom the movements of the Empire were as meaningless as clouds drifting past the horizon. Cid would forgive him, he would understand.

Larsa is quiet, for a long moment. "It's going to be war, isn't it."

Vayne hasn't officially been informed yet, just what their plans are, not that it could tell him any more than he already knows.

"We will drive them to their great fortress, and hit it with all our power. Dalmasca won't have it in them to continue the fight."

Rasler is a proud new king, but he will surely treat with them after such a defeat. Endure the humiliation of an occupation, rather than risk losing his new wife to Archadian fury.

"A cruelty for a kindness, then."

Vayne shakes his head. "That is giving it far too much justice."

"If you spoke with Father…"

Oh, that he could be the man Larsa believes him to be. "It is well beyond that, now. Too many stand to gain too much, to let this opportunity go by. If we do not move, and Rozarria does, we leave ourselves in a dangerous position. It is not the best of all possible worlds, there are surely few who would see it as such, but… everyone compromises."

"Even you?"

"Even me."

He can feel it, when Larsa steps up beside him. Allows himself one more moment of the impossible dream, of taking his brother away from this life, from what it might very well do to him, despite all of Vayne's intentions; the endless grind of Archadian politics, the hell of lesser evils.

"All that you have shown me today… I am privileged, beyond what I have any right to. I have been gifted with great opportunity - and even if it cannot be fixed in a single day, or even in a lifetime - it is my obligation to do what I can, to help who I can, even when there is no perfect answer. I am a Solidor, my life is lived in service to the people. You wanted me to see the whole of what that meant, to understand it, at least in some small part. I am very much in your debt, brother."

"We are family. All that I have is yours." So nice, to bury so much truth beneath a formal flourish, that Larsa thinks nothing of it. "However, if you do happen to have a extra chop, it will spare us a few more hours of climbing hedges."

* * *

"Hell no. You can just keep on walking, the both of you."

His brother does not have a chop, but they're close enough to the palace that Vayne assumes simply being himself will be enough to commandeer a simple ride. The driver recognizes him well enough as a noble, though it does not seem to be a mark in his favor.

"How many times you think I've had to do this? Some young rich boys go down to the slums for a thrill, get themselves tossed to the gutter, and expect me to pity them? The minute I get you to your door, I know what'll happen - it gets closed in my face, and I'm out the cost of a ride!" A second look at Larsa, a disgusted shake of his head. "… and you, look at you, far too young to start such terrible habits." Back to Vayne, before Larsa can properly protest. "You ought to be ashamed of yourself, getting him into this."

"Indeed I am." Vayne says, trying for contriteness, though he's had better luck convincing a room full of officials of his remorse than one annoyed driver.

"Oi, Jonti, what you got there?"

A second cab draws up next to the first, the driver quickly stepping out. Fresh gossip was by far the best.

"Just a couple of lords who think my time is theirs for the asking, and for free - and don't think I'm afraid of your brothers or fathers or whatever you think you can throw at me. Someone's got to tell you young men when enough is enough."

The second driver looks at Vayne, down to Larsa, back to Vayne - and goes white.

"Jonti."

Barely a whisper, not nearly enough to break through the continuing tirade, a simple matter of respect and does he know how much it costs to keep a cab in the air and what a missing chop can do to him back at the office. Of course not, nobles never work a day in their life, and his friend's eyes are going wider and wider, frozen in horror with one hand twitching rather frantically at his side. Vayne is fighting the smile when the man finally leaps for his friend, mid-admonishment, with what is practically a choke hold, whispering frantically in his ear. Vayne sees the driver stop, annoyance and indignant rage draining from him as if a cork had been pulled, and before he can say anything, both of them are on a knee, bowing low, eyes to the ground.

"I am sorry, my liege. Please… please forgive me. I didn't… by the _gods_, I swear I did not recognize-"

"It's all right. Please, don't worry yourself unduly. We are hardly in proper attire, and did not intend to cause such discord. I was certainly asking for no small favor."

The man stands straight up, practically at attention and so quickly Vayne thinks he might just fall over. Certainly pale enough for it. His friend keeps his eyes on the ground, though he seems to be trying to do his best to peek, to see the fate of his comrade, if not his own.

"It would be an honor, sir. Of course it would. I'll be happy to take you and the young master anywhere you would like to go."

"We are very much obliged to you."

As the skycab descends toward the walkway leading to the palace, it is clear someone has announced their arrival. Judge Drace is waiting, along with a complement of guards, though she turns to dismiss them as Vayne and Larsa clear past the doors. If the driver would wait, Vayne would find someone to get him a chop, though it is clear the man believes his own execution is but moments away, and obviously wants nothing more than for Vayne to forget he was ever born. He has his foot on the pedal the instant he is bid goodnight, out of sight even before they have made it to the top of the very short set of stairs.

Larsa is hesitant. "We're going to get in trouble."

Vayne snorts. "_I'm_ going to get in trouble. You are an innocent bystander, hijacked by my evil and irresponsible ways. Plausible deniability is your best option."

"Plausible what?"

Before he can speak, the Judge has crossed the distance between them. A good thing, he's shaken his brother's moral outlook enough for one day.

"Lord Larsa. Lord Vayne. We have been looking for you. I…"

Drace is convention-bound, entirely unimaginative and full past the brim with courtly manners, but it does not take her more than a few moments to notice what they're wearing, and come to the crux of the conversation.

"You went into town without a guard?" Vayne can feel her glaring at him from behind the helm. She wants very much, no doubt, to punch him in the face, has likely been wanting to do it for years. Vayne wonders if she dreams about it at night.

"Old Archades, actually."

He wishes he could see her face. The stunned, horrified silence is a truly beautiful thing.

"Oh come now, Drace, don't be cross." Vayne says, neither his expression or his tone making more than a fleeting acquaintance with apology. "You can hardly have an proper adventure if you bring nanny along."

Larsa throws him a small, disapproving look, reaching out to give the Judge's armored hand a reassuring pat. "My greatest apologies, Judge Drace. I did not mean to worry you. I shall endeavor not do so in the future."

"Not at all, my lord. The fault is mine, I should not have been so inattentive."

Quite fervently wants to punch him in the face. With the gauntlets on. It cannot possibly improve her mood, as he is bestowed with one of Larsa's brightest smiles, all boyish delight and mischief. It has been a grand adventure, and at the moment he is simply Vayne's little brother, and loves him best of anyone. He may respect his father with all due graces, may look with kindness on the whole of the court; Drace may be his closest guardian, perhaps the nearest he knows to a mother, but at the end of the day she is still only a soldier and Vayne is family, and no one will ever take that from him.

It is rather pathetic, how much he needs to know it.

"I ought go and order one of the stables prepared, I suppose" He says, eyes twinkling at the secret surprise of what will almost certainly be the most… interesting chocobo ever to wear royal colors, and bids goodnight to Drace. They both watch him go, pretending they are not. The simple street clothes really are no disguise at all - he is a prince, whether in jewels and silks or tattered rags and the dust of the slums.

"The Emperor would like a word." Drace says, almost certainly speaking through clenched teeth.

"Oh, yes. I imagine he does."

* * *

Vayne does not often come to the Emperor's private chambers. The decorations, all thick drapes, leaded glass and heavy, golden ornaments seem to add far too much to the gravity in the room, dragging everything down, expecting him to bend. It is not a comfortable place, intended to intimidate - even here, where so few are ever allowed.

"Father, I-"

The slap stings, and the backhand that follows neatly splits his lip, one of the Emperor's rings striking true. It seems the old lion has some fire in him still. Vayne stops short, somewhat grateful for the sudden recall to reality. Spending time with Larsa often leaves him more optimistic than is wise. He knows this, though. It is where he belongs.

Gramis paces back and forth, glaring at him now and again, shaking his head. Furious, or at least ready to take up the part. Maybe, years ago, Vayne would have bothered with the role of the penitent, but it doesn't fit anymore, pulling too tight in too many places.

"Look at you. Just _look_! I was told what you had done. Hours ago, it was suggested - but I said no. No, I could not believe that even you could be this foolish."

He truly is a marvel. Any playhouse would be glad to have him. The lead role in a great tragedy, the wise old king undone by his spiteful curse of a son.

"You are a selfish, stupid child." The hand rises, cuts through the air, a sharp gesture, obviously fighting the temptation to strike him again. "What would have happened, had he been killed down there?"

"Larsa longs to know of the world. He needs to see the people he will one day rule."

"He can see them perfectly well from the damn balcony! I warn you, Vayne-"

He turns his back on his father, on the Emperor of all Archadia. Once, he would have never dreamed, would not have dared, and it still is not the wisest move, to provoke him in the midst of his anger, but Vayne is so tired of pretending to give a damn, simply because he knows what is the cunning move, what is the proper way to treachery. Weary of pretending the man is wise simply because he is old, of swearing fealty to a father simply because of blood ties, that there is the slightest chance of… anything, anymore.

"What will it be then, your Grace? Beheading? Or hang me whole from the ramparts for the birds?"

The great Emperor so angry, because the hands those rings decorate are old and gnarled, because he can see from here the fall of the curtain and the end of the act, the audience ready to applaud, and in this late hour Gramis has decided to rewrite the script, hurriedly rushing off a new draft as fast as he can manage it. He is fearful of the end, perhaps for its own sake, or for the judgment that may follow.

"Do not test me, boy. You know very well-"

"Yes. I believe I do."

If one does not like the ending, then change the villain. So foolish, that he'd ever imagined it might be any other way. Father and son regard each other for a long, silent moment. At least Vayne does. He has long since given up trying to see the world through the old man's eyes.

"It does not have to be like this, Vayne. I never wanted…"

"Oh, was I misinformed? Explain it to me, please."

This is the way it is now. Reconciliation, the sudden shift to pleading for peace and understanding even though Vayne can still taste the blood in his mouth. He has been everything his father has ever wanted, given all that has been asked of him, and if it were only his life at stake, who is to say he would not give him this as well? Yet it is not, and they both know it.

"Do you truly feel justified in what you do, let alone in how you choose to act?" Gramis shakes his head, as if such a thought is impossible. "You do not see it, Vayne. The Senators fear you, the Judges-"

"The Senate has never had a use for a Solidor, save as a target."

"You provoke them! You revel in it! Encouraging their ill opinion, spending all your time with that deranged lunatic, secreted away-"

"Cidolfus Bunansa is going to win your precious war for you, my lord. Anything we have to wield against Rozarria, not to mention what we can do for our own people, all of it now comes from Draklor. Should they not be rewarded for their loyal service? You may not choose to observe it, but I do believe they sweat well for their coin, even so 'secreted away.'"

"… and now this!" His father charges on without pause, though perhaps he did take note, a scornful flash in his eye as Vayne dared to mention loyalty. "Pointlessly endangering the life of your own brother! Judge Drace has made her displeasure known, and though I did not wish to see it-"

Here it is, then. Larsa is all goodness and kindness and mercy, yet even he is only capable of absolving one of them in the end. Vayne should have seen it sooner, the clock ticking down long before his father's vague disinterest shifted into a curious appraisal, and finally the keen desire to take Larsa's growing popularity as his own final victory, casting off the fallen son in praise of his newfound, unspoiled child.

Vayne can still hear his brother's dying words, ever clear down through the years - at a time, all of them were the favorite son. Shaped into whatever purpose was most useful at the time, discarded when they became an unwanted reminder of an unwelcome past.

"-will not have you come to treat him as you have dared to treat me."

Quite a few members of the court exist in their own small, self-constructed worlds. Manufactured intrigues, wholly imaginary views of their own destinies and the forces at work against them. Vayne wishes he had the knack for it. Surely there are things he would rather justify, pass off as random, as necessities of fate. It seems to do no good to feel the whole of it like this, does not make things easier. His father stands but feet away and yet Vayne will never reach him.

"You make a great mistake, considering yourself untouchable, Vayne." Back to being the loathsome upstart, he can see it in the old man's eyes. Vayne wonders if it keeps the Emperor up at night, staring fretfully into the shadows while searching for ways to rid Ivalice of yet another treacherous heir. He might have done it already, but now he has the equal obsession of keeping his hands clean, as if the gods might not look too closely on the way to paradise if only he is properly clever now. "Your brother's popularity grows by the day, despite your efforts to ruin him. The people will cast their votes where they will, and should I choose to put my favor elsewhere…"

It is a technicality, the vote, two-hundred years of Solidor rule and everyone knows this. His father is play-acting at strength and Vayne is responding in kind, the only language shared between them and it is so very wearying, to give his all for a battle he does not even intend to win.

"What is it that you cannot bear to see, father? That Larsa loves me more, or that he loves me at all?"

Trained for this, his whole life, so that he sees only weaknesses, vulnerabilities and how best to exploit them, and his father cannot hide what he is, what he regrets or what he fears. The flawed man beneath the trappings of an Emperor, grasping for any glimpse of salvation. Perhaps in the end, that is all there needs be. Vayne is too old, and they know each other too well.

"Get out."

He bows. Decorum was invented just for moments such as these.

"I am as ever, your obdient son."

The anger burns in his father's eyes, all the more brightly for his age, his infirmity. "You are a viper, Vayne, and you will never take the throne."

Strangers on an empty stage, and perhaps there is not even an audience in the darkness, no one waiting for the performance to end. The thought seems almost too cruel to bear.

"And you are a sad, old fool."

It is the last time Vayne will speak with his father in private. Save one.


	6. the good, unluckily 1

A perfect Archadian morning. The sun rises gloriously, spilling through the high-arched windows, warm and bright across the shining marble floors. The birds sing, ducking in and out of the ivy that climbs up the trellises along the outer balconies, and from certain viewpoints it is possible to see maids all over the upper quarters flinging sheets to air out in the morning breeze, half the houses seemingly at full sail. Tiny drops of dew cling to the flowers in boxes at each landing, and Vayne has been up before dawn.

It is the day they take Nalbina Fortress.

* * *

He has been summoned to Archades rather than observe the battle, so his father may remind him that he is the leader of the Western Armada only when it suits the throne. Foolish, really, that the house arrest should come as any sort of surprise. Vayne has long cultivated an air of utter indifference just for days like this, that he may meet approval or censure or - some day, perhaps - the order for his execution with the lack of interest it deserves.

A petty slight to his pride and nothing more, whether he is there or not. At this point all involved want the same thing - ideally, to take Rasler Heios Nabradia hostage, and treat with King Raminas for the Shards and, most importantly, the Sun-Cryst. The Dalmascan king may very well be persuaded to give up its location at his daughter's pleading, that she should not lose her husband, and it is then that life will get very, _very_ interesting. A bloody race to reach the Sun-Cryst first, between all who have the knowledge and the means to try.

Of course the Emperor still believes he is in control, though the disaster at Nabudis has shaken his resolve, even while making clear the promise of the prize. Vayne will have a small window to work with, in the time between the new king's capture and the missive to Raminas, and no doubt, though the battle has not yet begun, Ghis is already thinking of ways to kill him, while Vayne seeks to return the favor.

House Solidor brought the Judges to Archades, what had once been a personal guard expanding to far more, establishing a new, and more stable system of governance, law and order throughout the Empire, with the Judge Magisters arbitrating for all save the Emperor himself. What many think this means is that there is a near-impenetrable wall of living steel between any threat of insurrection and the House they are bound to serve.

What it actually means is that the Judge Magisters will prove loyal until the day they are not. It may have been his House's greatest triumph, seizing control from the military to take the throne, practically rewriting the rules of state, yet a country will always need its protectors, its militia - and those men, call them generals or Judges or whatever else may suit the times, will forever chafe beneath the rule of another.

True loyalty is rare enough that it may as well not exist, far too easily counterfeited - it cannot be relied upon, and so Vayne has learned to look to self-interest instead. Know what a man values most, and you may predict how he will act through the course of his days. The Rozarrian spy, for example, who keeps herself within the ranks of the courtiers is happy to report back on details of the Judge Magisters to him in exchange for her life and the level of comfort and status she has grown accustomed to in Archades, passing those same secrets - of far less value once they leave the court - back to her masters in the south.

Or Drace, so defined by her honor that it is easy to make her his unwitting ally. Enemies are far more reliable than friends, nothing in her to be swayed or disappointed by his actions, or persuaded by others into losing her good opinion. Vayne cannot lose what never existed, and thus her unending disapproval is solid, easy to count on. Drace is fiercely devoted where it matters most, and so much the better that she always be uneasy, and train her protege much the same, Gabranth well on his way to surpassing her achievements. If she did not think Vayne such a danger, if the Emperor himself did not agree, how else would his brother even have her as what was practically his personal guard, and perhaps another soon to be raised to the position?

Let him be their enemy, and gladly, if it means two Judge Magisters will soon stand between Larsa and those who would threaten him.

Bergan respects power, never quite comfortable enough to lead, but all that means is that he can be convinced to try a coup by anyone with half a good idea, or even a bad one that would allow him to carve enough of a blood-soaked swath through those in his way. He is a simple man with simple tastes and violent appetites and what Judge Bergan values above all else is, naturally, Judge Bergan.

It will be Ghis who goes for his throat, unless Vayne should get absurdly lucky and the Judge Magister might somehow fall in battle, though the war thus far has not given him any hope for that kind of good fortune. Ghis is growing old, and such men look back upon their lives and oft see failure, no matter their successes. All that he has - respect, money, titles - it is not enough, all meaningless compared to what he thinks ought to be his.

In leveraging the power to survive within the court, Vayne had snatched away the glory the Judge Magister believed he was owed, the strength of infantry and its overwhelming might that could very well have ceded him an ascension. Instead of leading armies to grand victories, of taking the throne to great accolades, Ghis has watched as Vayne and Cid and Draklor rendered the ground troops subordinate to all that took place in the skies; Archades airships swiftly dominating in both conflict and commerce. Vayne's successes laid waste to whatever momentum was left in the Judge's impressive career, turning him into a respectable, triumphant figure of the past. Praised, honored and utterly _irrelevant_ - and Ghis will never forgive him for it.

Vayne must be some sort of savant, truly - so many different kinds of people all united in their hatred of him. It would not take much now, for Ghis to sway Bergan's so-called allegiance, and even Zargabaath might - well, it is the Sun-Cryst in the balance, is it not? Name the man who would not risk everything for the chance at such power.

One slip, one moment of weakness and as always, he will disappear between the claws and fangs of a hundred eager opportunists, and so Vayne keeps his calm and bides his time and it is simply another day. The messenger that meets him at the door of his chambers barely pauses, a slight bow and the first of what will be many such reports, keeping him informed. What is left of Nabradia's ground and air defense, backed by Rabanastre's support, are moving into position at Nalbina. It is not an unimpressive force, the fortress will not be easily taken - yet it is inevitable that it will be, as the rest of this war has been a steady march to a well-charted conclusion.

Unless Ondore has finally committed, and Rozarrian ships are moving even now, to keep the fleet occupied at Nalbina, while the rest will move to assist Bhujerba in seceding. Or Raminas is waiting until they have all gathered together, to unleash the power of the Dusk Shard, or the Dawn Shard, or both. Archades is proud of its military prowess, and has reason to be, but they are hardly as invincible as they would like to believe. It could all go wrong now, with no warning, and Vayne has been left with his hands tied, to do nothing but keep himself occupied and wait to see what the day will bring.

* * *

Over time, the range of Vayne's official duties has been greatly restricted. Far gone now, those instructive lessons of his youth, sitting in on the trials that Judge Magisters prevailed over, even watching his eldest brother on a few occasions as he petitioned the Senate, and from where he'd sat his brother's broad shoulders had blocked out the sun, seeming as fixed and indomitable as the palace itself.

Forever the dividing line in his life, the before and the_ after_ - and in the after, the Emperor had seen fit to assign him less… visible duties. The double-edged sword of Solidor, as ever, to be obedient and successful and, at the last, a pariah as payment for services rendered. Vayne had been quickly relegated to civil matters, seemingly useless busywork, but fortunately what noble Archades considered of little value did not translate to a waste of his time. It had taken several years of turning dross into opportunity, gaining allies of those who knew best how the city worked, how to maneuver unnoticed through unseen channels before they'd realized the extent of his work. At the same time there had been Larsa to consider, his brother's education the perfect excuse to return to places in the court Vayne knew he was not at all welcome.

He has come to measure success in many ways, and where there is no victory, it is still important to be as annoying as possible to one's enemies. Draklor's triumph has made them all terribly nervous, but it _is_ an unequivocal success, and so there is little even the Emperor can do in public but retaliate by constricting his daily tasks to the most meaningless of chores, all the while pretending it is worthy honor. Vayne now presides over an audience of completely useless, bickering nobles, only the highest of the Hundred names, where dragging House business before a Judge is considered far too gauche, and anything as base as a civil court is entirely out of the question.

"… I informed my sister that I was quite allergic to the _very_ trees she insisted on planting on the far corner of the north garden. Of course it gets a full wind in the afternoon."

The man sniffs, nose in the air, and Vayne has learned well that his awareness of the world does not exist more than two inches past it. Two months of meetings like this, every few weeks the siblings appearing for another chance to air out their private grievances in the guise of settling their late father's affairs. Excessively large hats are in fashion this week, it seems, and Vayne is amazed the woman doesn't topple over as her head snaps around, barely holding back a snarl.

"We were told that the trees would be good for the soil, which was damaged by a long period of neglect where my brother ought to have-"

"You just want to sell the damned thing, you always have, and you don't care that the petals go absolutely _everywhere_-"

"I am merely trying to explain how you let the house fall down around our beloved father's ears long before you'd chased him to his grave!"

Always amusing, and occasionally rather relaxing to take a vacation in someone else's reality. Vayne had ordered a full morning's worth of hearings to keep his mind occupied, but all had been moving rather quickly, at least until now.

House Calsesa is one of the wealthiest of the old Houses, which explains both the vast amount of holdings in the current tug-of-war, as well as the wide gulf between the surviving heirs and anything resembling a sane world view. Behind the squabbling duo stands a veritable army of moogles, responsible for cataloguing each slight, real or imagined, and keeping track of every inch of their inheritance down to the last fork in the silver cabinet. Vayne hopes they're doing their best to skim off all the gil they can manage when no one is looking, certain they more than deserve it.

Larsa has joined him this morning, ever curious, though from the sideways glances he keeps giving Vayne it seems he has come to regret this particular decision. The pair are in full fury now, and will continue to snipe at each other for what might be forever, though Vayne has never been able to make it more than a few minutes before cutting them off. Larsa raises an eyebrow, and Vayne makes a vague gesture, full approval to join the fray if he truly wishes to. Somehow his brother manages to clear his throat in a lull, cutting off the next volley before Vayne can give into the impulse to simply cast a Silence spell and be done with it.

"I was… under the impression that you had a particular issue to bring to our attention today. One that might help bring things to a successful conclusion."

It is important for Larsa to understand the disposition of all those in Archades, including those who are… aggressively ridiculous. Enough of them in inexplicable positions of power – and they must all be managed carefully, lest their wealth and boundless self-confidence convince them they can do more than play-act at serious matters. Vayne highly doubts either of them could point to Nalbina on a map, unlikely they even realize there is even a war on.

The man blinks, slightly surprised at being addressed by the younger Solidor, but when Vayne makes no move to intervene, he quickly regains his stride.

"Yes, yes indeed. It is of the utmost importance, I assure you. My father had in his collection many volumes of rare histories, including some of spellcraft-"

"-which you left to molder in the basement." The lady finishes, a snap of her fingers summoning a moogle forward, and Vayne leans down to take the scroll being offered, a full list of the library's contents. "He couldn't wait to get his hands on them, milord, but they were my father's favorites and I will not allow-"

"As if you could name a single one. I'm surprised you didn't use them as kindling already."

Vayne ignores the new volley of insults, scrolling swiftly through the list. The moogle has started with the rarest tomes first – the servants often much more competent than their employers - and it is not at all a poor sampling. It seems the late lord was a collector of antiquities, at least two dozen titles in archaic Kildean that may prove quite interesting with a full translation. Certainly nothing that deserves the fate of being relegated to some shelf to stand as an unread and dusty background to lackluster business affairs. He passes the list to Larsa, at least to give his brother a moment's distraction from the never-ending argument.

"I know what this is about, and it has nothing to do with books! You're trying to punish me for being father's favorite." The woman's voice rises, and Vayne wonders if the moogles ever consider earplugs, like those used in the labs for engine testing. "I'm not sorry that I am! If you'd shown half the dedication-"

"If our esteemed father hadn't had the sense to buy you a husband-"

"You dare!"

The information wasn't all that revelatory the first time they'd gone through it, let alone now. At times, the two of them will diverge into the bad business dealings on his part, the possibility of a slight scandal on hers and something to do with a dog. Vayne cannot forget the details of their lives quickly enough.

"The books belong with me!"

"I would _rather_ see them burn!"

"We shall add them to the library at the Grand College." Larsa says decisively, because taking a position of authority will often quite often substitute for actually having any. At least in this case, he is likely able to back up his words with action, although he still spares a quick glance at his brother, waiting for the nod of approval before continuing.

"It seems likely that such rare texts would be deserving of a room of their own. You would obviously each be free to examine them in private, at your leisure, and they will be well looked after. Your largess and generosity will be greatly appreciated - and if it would please, we would like you to choose a fitting tribute in his honor."

He smiles brightly. It really is an unfair advantage, very few who can say no to Larsa at his most charming and cheerful, and Vayne watches the two petitioners slowly nod, for a moment seeming almost reasonable.

"I believe that would be an excellent idea." The woman nods decisively, as if it were her own inspiration. "Certainly, they would appreciate such a gift, and it would serve our father's memory well."

"I agree." The man says, not to be outdone. "A space of his own, and a marble bust at the front, that all may see his noble profile."

The woman sniffs. "A painting would be far better."

"I don't see how. Anything worth doing is worth doing in stone."

"So cold and dull! Well, no wonder you like it!"

Luckily, the offer seems to have settled the current argument, at least enough for them to leave, though they continue to take jabs at one another all the way out of the room, trailed by their various attendants. Larsa stares after them, until the room is empty and still, and finally leans back with a poorly-stifled laugh, looking at Vayne as if waiting for an explanation, as if there's anything to say.

"It seems like they would have to… stop. Being themselves. Eventually." Larsa says quietly, though there is no one to hear. "I don't think I could manage that sort of display for more than a handful of minutes before losing my place."

"You have an excellent work ethic. I'm sure if you put your mind to it, you could soon be twice the fool of anyone in the court."

Larsa considers an eloquent response, and sticks out his tongue instead.

At the far end of the room, the door creaks slightly, a pair of eyes peering around the edge at a childish attempt at subtlety. One of his brother's friends, the second son of House Orlebar. Low Thirty, the lord a shipping magnate with nothing but business ambitions. If there is any hidden intention to that friendship it is only that Orlebar might be the first to hear rumor of any new developments in Draklor that will improve his bottom line. A safe alliance, all the more important because the boy is also Larsa's teammate, no doubt with a polo mallet in his other hand, eager to start the game. He waves, disappearing quickly when he sees Vayne watching. His brother is half out of his chair already, hesitating at the last, and Vayne leaves him hanging for a moment, just to torture him.

"Do you need me to solve any more problems for you then, Lord Brother?"

"Ah, so you've _finally_ discovered hubris. I'll be sure to give Calsesa to you in the future, if you're so confident." A second glimpse of the boy in the hall, Larsa still poised above the chair and waiting, politeness warring with impatience, though for his brother politeness always wins. "Well I'm certainly not about to prattle on when you would much rather be running about on a bird." Vayne flicks his hand dismissively. "Go on, then. Win the day."

Larsa is out the door like an arrow to the mark, leaving him to shuffle through what's left of the morning's business, listening to the bright sound of young voices echoing faintly down the corridor.

* * *

A football match is underway at one of the stadiums below, Vayne can hear the roar of the crowds echoing dully off the buildings as he steps out onto the narrow street below the palace. The semi-finals - it's Molberry, the Imperial Institute for the Applied Alchemical Sciences against Rienna's Archadian Grand College of the Magical Arts - and whichever of the schools wins this will face off against the Judicial Akademy in the finals. Hardly the most refined of sports, purely for the city's lower levels, but they have a box anyway, and perhaps he can encourage Gabranth to accompany them to the finals. It would be worthwhile, he has plenty of information but little first-hand measure of the man.

Cid will bet ten gil on the Akademy, and Vayne will most likely end up buying him lunch.

The buildings cast long shadows across most of the walk to Draklor, wide slabs of sunlight stretched here and there in the spaces between. Archades is all smooth glass and rose marble here, the administrative quarter's State buildings all cut from the same quarry. Rather quiet at mid-morning, he is alone on a bridge that is rarely used even for those few who can access it, the same sort of unbreakable glass they put in airships, etched with ornate knotwork at its edges and providing a clear view several hundred feet straight down, to one of the small rivers that traces through the city center. It glitters up at him, a silver chain.

A sharp clack cuts through the still air, the reason he hadn't bothered with the skycabs. Archades had never been particularly lush, even from its founding. Much of the city's green space has been filled in after the fact, long balconies stretching out from the sides of buildings, planted with trees and flowers, rooftop gardens and private enclaves set in any space fit to hold them. The largest and most elaborate of these belong, of course, to the upper levels, and he has a good view from here, of the wide field where his brother is currently making a run at the goal, chocobo moving at full tilt as he holds the reins in one hand and leans out, all but parallel with the ground to gain the best power for his swing. Vayne stops at the railing, can only come up with a dozen ways Larsa might be hurt or killed in the handful of moments it takes him to cross the field with the ball and score a very tidy goal.

His brother is progressing well with the sword, as good with magicks as Vayne ever was. As good at _anything_ as he ever was, and even more so in what he lacks, all smiles and easy laughter as he taps mallets with a teammate, wheeling his bird around. Vayne wonders on occasion, what he would have done had Larsa not turned out interested or capable of leading, though all that is mere conjecture now, his brother succeeding well in line with all expectations. It has been a long road, just to reach this point, and a singular victory that Larsa has never seen the struggle.

Increasingly difficult now that he is nearly grown, that his brother has already begun to attract the attention of the Senate and their greedy, grasping treachery. Vayne could have solved such a problem from the beginning, and kept him away from the world entirely - a more sensible man might have, surely there are many nobles who do so. Shielding his brother as one would raise a rare orchid in the ornamental gardens, perfect and innocent and left to be dashed to pieces with the first breath of a storm.

It will not do. Despite his reputation Vayne is neither omniscient or omnipotent, there will always be dangers he cannot anticipate, threats he will not be there to face no matter how he might wish it so. Larsa is well-situated for the moment, self-assured and clever, and Vayne will see him through this no different than what has come before, as brother and mentor and - most importantly - the bigger target. Fortunate, that he seems to bring out the very worst in people. Most of those who would go after his brother are far more interested in watching Vayne bleed first, up close. As it ought to be.

The guards at the front gate salute as he passes through into Draklor, most of the the artificers and scientists within well accustomed to his presence, no real surprise to see him, informal bows or even nods his standard greeting. Technically they're all part of the military, but only a handful actually come from the Akademy, hardly any with the House rank to bother learning much in the way of etiquette.

Draklor has long been Vayne's refuge, more comfortable here than the palace ever was, even before he'd made it his own. One of the more motley places in Archades, especially compared with the rest of the upper levels. Cid is blind to all except results, which means the tests go out and the results come back and so there are third daughters and fifth sons and even the odd bangaa in the mix. A fair number of Moogles, always, and occasionally even a few Bhujerbians, though both he and Cid vet each of them before they are placed, and very rarely allowed into the most secure areas. Vayne is the state here, and should he flaunt convention there is no one to argue otherwise.

Cid's chief of staff is, believe it or not, Rozarrian, come to Archades as a girl. No love lost with her homeland, her parents well-off enough to be worth murdering in the streets by a rival family, while she and her sister had fled to the safety of distant cousins and a new life in the Empire. Quite young for such a staggering intellect, and with a quick enough temper when her loyalty is brought into question. Dedicated to science, to Archades, and if it is to revenge against the old rather than patriotism for the new that moves her, she is all the more trustworthy for it.

Vayne takes the lift up, no need to stray from the outer sections of the lab, the sections he shows off to guests and cranky Senators who want to complain about the destination of so much of the money they consider their own. It is open and airy, with banks of windows and an architecture that compliments its surroundings, quite pleasant - and beneath the facade is the most secure building in Archades, an absolute fortress in the center of the city.

He hasn't even had to fight for it - in order to do so much dangerous work inside the city limits, it's been practically demanded of him to fortify the interior rooms, and the same protections that keep any danger contained and secure also render it all but untouchable from the outside. It would take several rounds of concentrated fire from even the Alexander's main guns to punch any sort of hole through the walls, and no one would even be able to try, not in the middle of Archades, with Draklor nestled so close to the rich and powerful. Issues of security and access have made it possible to keep any Judges as far away from its core operations as he can. As far as Vayne is aware, even his father hasn't been able to bribe his way past the first few floors.

A safe base of operations for Cid, then, and a fair shelter for Larsa in the event of any number of worst-case scenarios. Vayne doesn't bother worrying over the details, better to simply expect that things will one day go wrong, and keep as many useful solutions at the ready, than to try and plan for a single one, only to be foiled by unseen circumstance.

* * *

In addition to its other functions, Draklor also serves as an instructional facility. Closely linked with the Institute, the very best way to ensure the best pick of new talent. The larger of the auditoriums seats just over five hundred, and today every seat is full, with students stacked in twos and threes in the aisles, more standing along the back and leaning in through the doors, along with some faculty and even a few scientists from the labs. Looking down from the balcony, Vayne can see a few pom-poms waving here and there, moogles using size to their advantage, sneaking into the gaps no one else can fit.

"Lining up to see if I'm as crazy as all the rumors say." Cid had said, trying to play it off with a laugh. "A man can build a thousand airships, but if he talks to _just one_ voice in his head…"

It shames him, the gossip, the rumors, though Cid would never admit to giving a damn. Vayne's done his best to convince the doctor that even if he _were_ mad, it's certainly an enviable sort of lunacy. Little doubt anyone in this room would be glad to endure the most vicious slander or public rejection, were it to gain them the sort of knowledge he has been privy to.

Unlikely that anyone in attendance today has come to sneer, regardless. Vayne can see nothing but open notes and bowed heads, dutifully taking notes off of the figures that already fill two boards behind him, equations he cannot tell the back or front of. If he wants any hope of understanding, he will have to ask Cid to explain later. Slowly.

"… forgive the momentary descent into poetry, but it ought be quite clear - obedience is a vastly inferior form of veneration. We are not isolated from the world around us, but we are not required to bow to those who seek to chain our potential, be it the demands of men or some grand ideology or even the gods. In flesh we are but weak and mortal, yet seizing the fire of intellect and the force of will, are we not the very hand that guides the weave of history?"

He knows this particular speech well enough, could match the gestures if he really wanted to. A quite familiar chapter and verse in the scripture of Dr. Cidolfus Bunasa, preaching to the converted. Cid is a consummate showman, invested in every word - it is nothing less the sum of life and legacy, delivered with the pride of a master craftsman.

Quite rare, these days, that Cid has the time or opportunity to give lectures, hence the overcrowded room and the silence save the hasty scratching of endless nibs on paper. Vayne cannot talk to Venat directly, and yet he thinks there is an understanding between them, that Cid has been let alone long enough to play academic for a day. It is a small reassurance; that Venat has learned some sense of the value of the good doctor, and how he ought be carefully treated.

"-considerable amount of time, there was no proper study of even the base reaction of a Glossiar ring. The form had been improved upon, the function brought to a high art, but the study was purely mechanical. How to improve its ability, altering the exterior structure, refining its core elements. The question of _why_ it worked at all was considered of little importance. It has been only with the advent of the study of Nethicite that we may consider expanding upon the essential principles-"

Cid has his coat slung over the back of a chair, sleeves rolled up carelessly as he continues to chart out the theory and design of so many years hard labor. An impressive scar winds around his left forearm, all the way to the wrist. Not Nethicite-related, though he carries a few marks from that as well. House Bunansa has a history as extensive and dignified as any in Archades - all the more amusing for Cid, then, to have the titles of the gentry and the body of a lifelong shipwright: callused hands and thick knuckles, nicks and burns, though they agree he would have to choose an unfortunate tattoo to truly complete the look.

Vayne's responsibility, to keep watch over the scholar, when no doubt Venat could have him charging into any number of dangers simply by suggesting it might yield an interesting result. Shipbuilding is a young man's game, adventuring even more so, and Cid has absolutely no sense of self-preservation in the face of scholastic temptation, all hesitation lost with the hint of an undiscovered truth. Giruvegan had been proof enough of that, striking out alone to seek out lingering secrets in the damned ruin had all but killed him, leaving Vayne helpless to do anything but rant at the empty air; certain that Venat could hear him, and it would do well to remember that Cid was mortal and far from invulnerable or Vayne would _find_ a way to strike at it, and to hell with the consequences.

The good doctor, for whom Vayne would threaten what he cannot even see. If there is a better definition of friendship than such willful stupidity, he does not know it. As much a mutual awareness of each others vulnerabilities as anything- he and Cid are so tangled in each other's secrets that any betrayal would likely destroy them both. A rather cynical view, and not at all the truth - that Cid stands in a rare society of two, the only other person Vayne no longer measures purely in terms of his usefulness. It is dangerous, to have pieces on the board that he cannot sacrifice, but he cannot quite bring himself to regret it.

"-that the stone speaks, no differently than any hume with an incantation, though in this case conversing directly with Magicite, with the Mist as a common medium. This language, such as it is, remains mainly inaudible, other than the expected middle-C resonation in a fully functioning engine, as I'm sure you have all heard. Nethicite, in comparison, resonates in an easily distinguishable G-sharp. At this point, we are still only able to recognize what is happening as a matter of effect than by pinpointing the cause-"

At first, it had all been so simple. A matter of tactics no different than the rest of Vayne's life, looking for the best opportunity for power and position, and there stood Doctor Cid and his research and his lab. Overlooked by most of Archades, unappreciated work being done by those without name or status - scholarship only had value if a Judge's appointment lay at the other end, or some other courtly duty. Scientists had been of the same value as ship mechanics then, little better than day labor. It had been an inefficient, unorganized system - which meant there had been breathtaking potential in it, and Vayne could hardly take credit for what had, in the end, required so little effort on his part, simply bringing in the gil and the authority of his name.

Soon after, that Cid had lost his wife, and long before the Nethicite or Venat or any of it, it had been clear his future was Vayne's to decide. Step in and save the doctor from the edge, drag him back into the world and keep him there - or lose him forever to the depths of his lab, still useful but no longer quite as he had been. It seemed a loss, even then, sacrificing but a single facet of such a man. Cid is easily the most brilliant person Vayne has ever met, Venat's appearance only confirming the obvious. The doctor has been chosen, in this place at this time, because there is no one else who can do what he is capable of. A mind to match that of those who seem as gods.

Just look at him now, the keen, piercing gaze all but demanding answers from the world, always at his best with a problem before him that he can chase to ground, excitement occasionally outpacing even his eloquence, grandly gesturing to try to bridge the divide between the two.

"As to the problem of manufacted Nethicite, and how we may consider improving upon its rather limited ability to speak, this is an issue you will likely take up should you enter the field in any greater capacity. We shall be studying this purely in matters of theory at the moment - attempts until now to alter the crystal habit even at seed form have proven near-impossible, and as thus we have been forced to proceed with a energetic but relatively inarticulate final structure."

In the event anyone wonders just how far Cid exists beyond the average man, here is where Vayne would set the mark. The Nethicite that has all but started a war across Ivalice, the object of desire for anyone who knows of its existence, and it is merely 'limited,' little more than an imperfect copy of what ought to be. Vayne does not consider himself to be particularly stupid, curious enough to fill in the gaps in his knowledge as he finds them, but he has no doubt any student in this room could go beyond him in the span of a few sentences. He is many things, but never more than a visitor here.

It is humbling. Vayne enjoys being humbled. A ward against complacency, when that is but a simple, inexcusable step from ending on the wrong side of an assassin's blade, or in humiliation beneath the executioner's sword, wondering how it all went wrong.

"As we now understand it, Magicite loses much of its vocabulary as it is processed into Nethicite, though such potential is not realized even within its original form. Nethicite has more power to speak, as it were, but lacks anything of interest to say. Hardly uncommon, as such things go." A slight murmur of laughter, and Cid grins for a moment before turning back to the board. "The expression of this decay is shown as follows, as the axial system shifts completely between breakdown and reformation. In extreme cases it may collapse completely - in pre-production, this would be where you start to see dangerous fluctuations and unstable fracturing when magical power is introduced-"

A new set of baffling equations, though Vayne's already been given the simplified version, with more truths than Cid can offer these students, the actual formulas still closely guarded. The reason the Doctor knows manufacted Nethicite is not living up to its potential, as Venat has given him the vision of what it _ought_ to be. A stone with power a hundred times, a thousand times greater than what they are able to create. A crystal structure with both power _and_ the ability to express it in full, and the potential of such a thing would be unimaginable, if Cid had not already given him so many impossibilities, secrets of the world's lost ages that Vayne can hold in his hand.

"… may be an issue with diffusion, although even attempts to alter the pathways of Magicite for improved function in airships have rarely produced dependable results, and this is a much trickier procedure. As you no doubt are all aware, we have had catastrophic failures along every stage of the process - if the generation mixture is off during the initial stages of growth, the crystal will reabsorb into its solution and then explode. If the proper balance is not maintained as it is refined, or the magicks fluctuate by the slightest amounts, it will explode. If there are any sudden shocks during the refining process - well, you get the idea."

It's not even necessary for it to go badly for there to be 'issues'. The last slight glitch involving Nethicite and what Cid had deemed 'sympathetic vibrations' had shattered every window for nearly six blocks in all directions outside of Draklor. It had proved an excellent way to increase funding for further fortification of the lab's inner walls, once the irate screaming had stopped.

"As far as we know, the last formula Rozarria managed to smuggle from us was mostly accurate. I understand you could _still _hear the explosion half a mile away. Nethicite is brittle, it is fickle, and it does not suffer fools gladly - if you should someday appear without your favorite arm, everyone will know why."

Another ripple of soft laughter. Draklor has its share of scientists with families and children, normal men and women who work normal hours and have actual lives. Vayne is more familiar with those who work closer to the center of the lab, the handful of bright-eyed fanatics among the students in this room who will eventually take orders directly from Cid himself. The kind who prefer to sleep under their desks, who generally have to be ordered home and then spend all their off hours designing their own test ships anyway. After a life spent with men who would slit each others throats over the barest hint of a nebulous reward, there is something quite pleasant about seeing that same obsessiveness bent to the simple pleasure of knowledge, of _look what I can do_.

"I hope then, that I've given you a bit of an overview into our current work here, and the breathtaking potential we have only begun to tap into." Cid pauses, hand at the edge of the chalkboard. "And for those of you who've been patiently waiting for me to get to the _point_ of all this-"

He flips the board over with a theatrical flourish, revealing a ship Vayne has followed from the moments after his team had finished last year's design, already suggesting ways it could be improved. Murmurs of approval throughout the crowd - it is not the end goal of any of Draklor's research, but consistently building the fastest and most impressive looking ships for the single-engine racing circuit certainly gains them a respectable amount of attention. The ship is low, sleek and even as a sketch it looks capable of highly irresponsible speeds.

"As it is still a highly restricted material, the Chione does not employ Nethicite, however we've managed to use the knowledge gained in its study toward the development of the engines. It has a top speed of three-hundred-ten, with zero to sixty in two point three seconds. Full stop takes just under four."

Racing is popular sport among the various manufacturers, a way to show off the best that they have to offer, and illegal runs are even more popular in Old Archades, where the racing isn't remotely safe or sane, and utterly lawless. The stretches of crumbling infrastructure, old aqueducts and toppled columns are the loosest definition of 'track' there can be, but also the only space within the limits of Archades that can properly put a ship through its paces. Cid has made a point of not asking how many of his acolytes sneak down into the ruins with their own, home-built machines, or the Draklor prototypes of years past, stripped down to the bare bones.

Cid's own son had run the underground courses like a champion, with whatever ship he could get his hands on. A shame he'd entered the Akademy instead of continuing on with the sciences, or they might have found a way to keep him.

Vayne does not flatter himself, that it all has gone as either he or Cid had hoped for, or perhaps even planned on, but despite considerable opposition they have managed to build a world here, and it has grown and thrived. All he has to do is look down into the eager crowd, and on the stage, Cid must see the same.

An uncertain future, but at least there is a steady place they may stand to meet it.

* * *

The state of the doctor's inner sanctum suggests that a dozen people, all working on different projects, suddenly had the impulse to toss everything into the air and run out screaming. Never exactly tidy, the situation has deteriorated badly in the last few years, as Cid's life has been upended by new discovery, with more and more more projects put on extended hold. Vayne maneuvers with long practice around the piles of paper, with random airship components sticking out here and there, or scattered haphazardly across the floor, a few discarded memstones completing the look.

An architectural marvel, really, in the tomes stacked up into precarious positions on the shelves, more scrolls and loose papers piled on any book that sticks out more than a quarter inch. All covered in varying levels of dust, depending on how long they've been pushed to the side. A handful of most of the documents in this room would be worth thousands, tens of thousands to Rozarria. If Cid ever took an interest in defecting, any of the ruling families would flock to bury him in titles and estates and gold-dipped virgins.

A massive sculpture takes up most of the narrow shelf on the back wall, a hundredth-scale replica of the Leviathan, one of Cid's earliest successes. The ship's outer plating is missing, revealing every deck, each supporting system and minute detail of its construction. A gift from the people of Archades, from the Emperor, for twenty-five years faithful service. In the drawers beneath, leather-bound folios in ivory parchment and onionskin contain the finalized blueprints for every ship Cid has ever designed, near-transparent pages with crinkling layers outlining each section of the ship's systems.

Works of art, all, though at the moment Vayne's attention is focused entirely on the half a pie resting at the corner of the desk, and he gives the crust an inquisitive tap, pleased to find it isn't a fossil. Most likely breakfast, forgotten about as Cid was distracted by some problem or another. He pulls off his gloves, stuffs them into a jacket pocket, and makes a mockery of several years of etiquette lessons by tearing into it with his hands.

Draklor has its own cooks, both as a security measure and to keep the noble born less fussy about the barbarians in their midst. Given the range of origins of the staff, they've been able to attract more than a few interesting culinary options beyond the usual Archadian standard of boiling all the taste out of the food. The pie has nutmeg, cinnamon and just a hint of allspice, which is nothing special but still three spices more than Cid's usual preference. He may be a genius, but the man's appetites are woefully upper noble.

"Yes, you're quite right, but even if we had the magicks to maintain that sort of core temperature, let alone anyone with the stamina to attempt such an extended burn - we'd melt the room and the equipment before the Nethicite could show any result. No… I don't - yes I understand what you're - well I _am_ rather stupid, as you are well aware."

Cid is pacing back and forth in a smaller, adjoining room with even more shelves and papers stacked high, cabinet doors open and threatening to upend their contents at any moment. It seems the doctor is in a good mood, despite the argument he is having, or perhaps because of it. It is not as difficult as one would think, having conversations with a man who often pauses to address the empty air, though not a skill Vayne ever thought he would need to learn. Cid nods briefly, acknowledging his arrival, even though his attention is still fixed on a point two feet higher and to his left.

"Well, at least in that sense, it might not be so impossible to - the shape of a blade is only convention, after all. Rather archaic, really."

"Is this going to be a theory with five zeroes or six?" Vayne says dryly. "I'd almost think you held a grudge, the way you fill my days with empty coffers and angry Senators."

Cid grimaces, even less patience for the bureaucrats than Vayne does.

"As if they know any other way to be. You secure my funding for the quarter, I'll get you fifteen percent off the total engine cost for cruisers and dreadnoughts, with a twenty percent power increase across the board. We'll see them complain about that."

"And?" Vayne says - it's the other work that actually matters, that everyone knows they're doing but no one will speak of, but Cid's back to nodding at the empty air.

"No, I don't suppose so. Yes, that might work, but… no, that would take some doing. It certainly won't be built in a day, and even if you may have all the time in the world… You are more than welcome to stay, if you like. I am sure… ah, yes, then. I will see what I can do."

A pause, and Vayne wonders how he can tell when Cid is no longer looking at the phantom and is simply staring into the distance instead.

"I do wonder where Venat goes. How else does such a creature occupy its time?"

"Watching people in the bath, I imagine." Vayne replies. "I do not have to be here, if there is work to be done between you."

Cid shakes his head. "Always work to be done, but I am less the apt pupil than I ought to be, as of late."

"Venat is… disappointed?"

"Oh, nothing so common." Cid sighs, makes a frustrated gesture which means the actual explanation is about an hour long and would bore a normal man cross-eyed. "The world it knows, or knew - the techniques, the materials on hand… the distance between what Venat assumes I can do and what I am actually capable of is… optimistic at the best of times. Nethicite itself is one thing, but this treaty blade - there are things that are like breathing to an Occurian that I have not the mark or measure of. We speak the same words, yet hardly the same language."

Vayne licks a bit of congealed syrup off his thumb, tossing the empty pie tin back on the desk. "Keep it simple, if you will. I spent all morning in mediation."

"Judges?"

"House Calsesa."

"Good gods, those fools are still at it?" Cid moves carefully through the piles on his desk, shifting them from one side to the other, looking for something. "What is it now, the tapestries or the furniture? You ought burn the whole place down, let them squabble over the ashes."

"I have no doubt they would. It seems to be mostly over, though in order to escape I was forced to resort to… drastic measures."

Cid smiles knowingly. It is not the first time Vayne's used Larsa's precocious charms to avoid another ten hours of tedious debate. "Your brother is well, then?"

"Always. So what is this new problem of yours?"

"The same problem as ever. It's all diamonds scratching diamonds. We have a difficult time doing anything with Nethicite as it is, and that's when we can encourage it to crystallize properly. Attempting to modify at the seed form yields some results, but there's only so far to shape it once it's started growing. So dense, and damned unstable even when we _can_ crack it - and manufacted's nothing compared to the real thing. This blade, if it's to go through the Sun-Cryst itself…"

Magicite is simple storage, a one-use battery, the Mist within it bouncing off the channels and paths inside, a temporary source of power. Nethicite, in comparison, does not lose all of its Mist, even fully drained, and the Mist that remains within its pathways refracts and bends and - changes, over time, or so Venat has said. Gives it a certain kind of life. Manufacted Nethicite is dumb, and the only paths they can create within it are rough and simple things. Still, it contains a network of channels twenty to fifty times that of Magicite, absorbs magicks like a sponge and can be extremely powerful if properly utilized.

Deifacted Nethicite, in comparison, is a network of endless fractal pathways with ages for the Mist inside to steep. Dense and unbreakable, nothing in any standard armory capable of scratching it, let alone destroying it. The Shards do not simply resonate - they can reach out , interact with their surroundings. From what Cid has learned it seems likely they are somewhat aware of their surroundings, and even then they are but fragments cleaved from an even more powerful whole.

The Sun-Cryst is _alive_, with even the spare details Venat has revealed of its construction there can be little doubt of that. Potentially as conscious as any other creature, with a will of its own and perhaps - Cid has speculated - even watching the world turn, observing all of history through the Mist. Eons spent in silent observation from wherever it has been hidden away.

Venat does not answer any of the important questions. How it came to be, if it has _always_ been or if the Occuria had actually brought it to life, and just how destructive its power is, if unleashed. Only how to destroy it, only that it must be destroyed. It does run counter to Vayne's usual impulse of keeping all avenues open, not discarding a potentially useful tool, but - especially after Nabudis - it seems there is some sense in Venat's insistence.

Who knew what had happened, ages ago, why Raithwall had chosen to take only slivers of the Sun-Cryst's might for his own? Just why it had been so long kept from the hands of humes. Maybe it has truly been watching them all this time.

Maybe it doesn't like what it sees.

"Venat has not provided any further clues?"

"Clues? Answers, all but written out for me, yet we lack the barest of essentials. The technology for such equipment does not exist anywhere in Ivalice. I would need to spend ten, twenty years building the infrastructure first."

Of course this is Cid, so he's likely cobbled together at least half a solution out of spare glossair rings, bolts and bits of rope already.

"I would give you more time if I could, but I fear we are quickly approaching the end of our advantage."

"It goes well with Nalbina then?" Cid shakes his head. "I am still amazed that king of theirs never thought to marry the girl off to you."

Vayne shrugs. "He must have heard about my habit of devouring virgins whole. I suppose it's for the best. A wedded life would leave far less time for the orgies."

Cid makes a thoughtful sound. The benefits of courtly manners. If it were a real competition it could be a week before one of them might slip and crack a smile.

"You are certainly insatiable. I wonder how my old bones have lasted this long."

"Oh, don't put yourself down. You hardly creak worse than the bed springs."

He would be lost, to do this alone. Either he would be completely out of his mind or he would be no different than the rest of the damned fools in court, and given the option Vayne would much prefer to be a lunatic.

The doctor continues shuffling papers, voice musing and mild. "Who knows, perhaps Bergan will end up dueling me for your hand? He seems the jealous type."

"And there is an image that will haunt me to my very grave. Thank you, Cid." The doctor chuckles, acquiescing, and Vayne smiles, though it doesn't last. He did ask about the war. "Nabradia is not without skill in battle, but there are few strategies open to them, once they are forced to stand and fight, and a bottleneck gives very little advantage with our ships in the skies. Yet again, it is your achievements that will give us the day."

"The Emperor has said as much."

It is not all that surprising, or perhaps only that it took him this long to make the attempt to turn Cid to his side. Desperate, frightened old man. Almost pitiable, how far he's falling behind, and Vayne would enjoy it more if such failures weren't likely to make the Emperor all the more likely to act without thinking.

"What did he offer you?"

"I may be a curse on the industry, but…"

"Doctor, you _are_ the industry. What did he say?"

"Nothing of consequence. He just wished to see that I was productive - and still too far gone to be of any real use to him. You would think by now that I ought be insane enough to get out of _all_ of my meetings…"

Each of them has used the other as an excuse for ducking out of all kinds of obligations, enough that Vayne has lost count, though he does not have Cid's added option of simply ranting to the air as a way of avoiding unwanted conversations.

"He threatened Draklor, I'm sure?"

Cid has his glasses off, cleaning them on the edge of his shirt. "Oh, with all due apology. The Senate is trying to freeze spending, so he says. It is a matter of fiscal caution, a… 'shared uncertainty, over how to best allocate resources in the current climate'."

Even without a direct war, there is nothing for the laboratory to do but grow stronger, more essential in a dozen ways domestically, and that is not discounting the endless, simmering conflict with Rozarria, fear of the unknown driving the need for the protection they provide that much higher. If Vayne wanted to try for a coup, it might be done with very little trouble before the year was out. Gods willing, it will not come to that, not when a seamless transition would far better serve. The old man may have spent the better part of a decade at death's door, playing it for all it is worth, but even he will have to pass from this age eventually, though it seems all too likely they will have to pry his unwilling corpse off the throne.

"Do not trouble yourself over the Senate. I'll deal with the consequences."

"You always do." Vayne realizes after a moment, that Cid is actually angry on his behalf. Surprisingly touching, though he had given up on anything better than antipathy from the Emperor a very long time ago. "He was _shocked_ at where things stand, of course. As if he could not imagine a part for himself in any of it. A tale of woe, that you were no longer the sweet boy he raised - and even though I am obviously deranged, would I support the effort to put your brother on the throne? Young and inexperienced as he is, not even of age, and let's not discuss how in the hell he would ever manage to _keep_ it."

"It's not personal. It never has been. What would you do, doctor, if you built a machine that you could not longer rely upon?"

A scowl, the same look Cid gives him whenever Vayne refers to his life as the tactical blunder that it truly is. No doubt the Emperor regrets it more with each day, and there is something magnificent in the idea that his father would have preferred for him to fail and die, years ago. Who knew for certain, perhaps he'd never intended for _any_ of them to survive.

"After all that you've done in his name, he thinks he can just buy it out from under you. That all loyalties are as cheap and meaningless as his own."

"Promise not to betray me for less than a dukedom."

Cid snorts. "I'm already an Earl, for all the good it does me."

Back to shuffling papers across the desk, though Cid is likely wishing he were working on something with more moving parts that he might occasionally bash with a wrench, now and then. No one should have to stand between him and the Emperor, to be anywhere in range, when Gramis' paranoia finally gets the better of what's left of his common sense.

"Will you hire someone to do it, or just poison my tea?"

The doctor ponders his options. "I thought I would build a robot. I've always wanted to build a robot."

Vayne is sure a messenger will be waiting for him, as soon as he leaves the lab. He doubts the battle will be over quite this early, though this would be the first moment to learn that something has gone wrong. Even if nothing has, there are plans to be made.

"How fast could you take down the Leviathan's engines, should it be required?"

"Sneak in? Two hours, if that, and they won't have it moving for a week. Give me half a day, without anyone to tell me no, and I'll cripple the Ifrit and the Shiva as well. The Alexander's a bit trickier, not that it will matter, when Ghis can get a dozen private ships in the meantime."

"He might have some trouble with anything too insubstantial. Rozarria's been watching the sea. Discovered some old pieces of legend that the Sun-Cryst is out there somewhere. Anything from Archades moves, and they'll be on it."

Venat has severed all ties with its fellows, which unfortunately means losing the crucial detail of locating the Sun-Cryst on a map. Still, they know more than most, including the fact that knowing where it is and actually reaching the damned thing are two entirely different problems. Once it is located, Venat ought to be able to get them past any of the Occurian defenses - although perhaps not an Esper, should one of those be in place, but then Vayne might just as easily be able to feed the Rozarrians to it. Or Ghis. Or both.

"I can get you a ship. I can get you one of _their_ ships, or at least a good mockup. By the time Rozarria realized it was you, you'd be there. Wherever that might be."

"Destroying the Sun-Cryst we can't reach, past gods we can't see, with the treaty blade we don't have." It isn't meant to accuse, Vayne just isn't as familiar thinking it all out loud, measuring up what he needs to have happen against all the unknowns that stand in his way. "I'll want Larsa here, when Raminas gives up its location. Lock him in, if you must. It will keep him safe enough, until this is resolved."

The door opens with a soft hiss, slightly surprising, only a few with the proper clearance for this area. Vayne vaguely recognizes the man that steps in - barely of age, actually, possibly not even through the Institute before the lab had snapped him up. Very little is visible behind the boxes and books in his arms, but usually Vayne's only seen pieces of him anyway, one hand gesturing from beneath or behind an engine, a foot dangling down from where he's wedged himself into a half-finished craft. A rare sighting, the bright eyes that peer from around the stack, and it's reflexes honed from months of working with unstable Nethicite that keeps him from dropping it all on the floor.

"Damn, sir. I didn't realize you were in here, or you - I mean, your Grace. Or I wouldn't have, obviously…"

He steps quickly over to the table, sliding the books back into his hands but leaving the crate behind, and steps back just as fast.

"I heard you wanted that up here, so I said I'd bring it along. Didn't mean to burst in like that, of course." A pause, and when he isn't tossed from the room, he smiles. "I signed off on a second round of tests on the new batch of glossair rings, sir. The prelims were good but last time half of them still had stress fractures in a sixmonth and we're not quite sure why. Lucky they're all for the small ships, nothing too difficult to replace, but still…"

"Keep me updated." Cid says, but his eyes haven't left the crate. It isn't much to look at, dirty wood slats and a few random tags at the top, written over in the wide, looping, mostly incoherent scrawl that seems to be a favorite of most of the academics he has seen. The man nods, and bows, and within moments they're alone again.

Cid still hasn't moved. Vayne sighs.

"You might as well tell me. As long as it's not good news. I don't do well with good news."

The doctor doesn't answer. He's stopped moving, one hand in a loose fist on the desk. All of his personality comes from constant motion, a fluid language of strides and gestures. Cid does not now know how to keep still, and it is unnerving to see him so quiet.

"I wanted to have actual answers, before I troubled you further. It is hardly an auspicious time for baseless conjecture."

"As if it ever is." Vayne watches quietly, as Cid slides the crate apart, a series of interlocking pieces unfolding to reveal a rather nondescript rock sample, light and dark grays and browns all sandwiched together in wide and narrow bands.

"A geology student from the Grand College was studying some cliffs near the Cerobi Steppes. He mentioned some odd, random findings in passing to one of the interns, who thought I might be interested. I suppose I have a… reputation for curiosities."

Vayne smiles slightly at the deliberate understatement, and reaches out, brushing his fingers across the rock. A bit of powder gray softness clings to his skin from a thinner band in the middle, almost like ash.

"Magically inert." Cid says quietly. "The surrounding layers are no different than any other soil, but that layer there - there's no Mist in it at all."

Which is an impossibility, but the doctor already knows that, or he wouldn't bother showing him this. Mist is like air, like water - it saturates everything in the world, and though they've managed to create clean rooms, temporarily free of its influence in Draklor, there is no banishing it in any permanent fashion, let alone…

"How?"

"I don't know."

"You have a theory."

"I always have a theory." Cid taps at the edge of a stone with a fingertip, thoughtfully. "The depth of this strata, it's around… four thousand years old? Give or take a few centuries. I did send out for a few more samples, no absolute proof, but... it's all the same. Everywhere that we can find it, it's the same. Whatever did this, it could very well have affected all of Ivalice, at the least."

"A power that could drain every drop of Mist out of the land?"

Thousands of years old? No logical explanation? What else could it be, but the Sun-Cryst? Here before them, then - the very evidence of its birth.

"Do you think there's enough ambient Mist on the planet right now, to-?"

"No, not at all."

The only other origin point for Mist, besides the planet, is from the creatures that live on it. It's what allows them to use magicks - a part of everything, though there's no way to… harvest it. At least, not that anyone still knows of. Which means that knowledge could very well have died, along with nearly everything else, to bring the stone to life.

All that Venat wants is to destroy the Sun-Cryst, for reasons it will not explain. The Occuria are all little better than phantoms, from what he can tell. Surprisingly impotent, despite their supposed immortality. Venat broke all vows just to speak with Cid, to reach out. It does not sound like much of a godhood to him.

One thing to ponder Armageddon. Quite another to rub the crumbling memory between his fingertips. Vayne can all too well imagine some glorious plan gone terribly wrong. A matter of pride and misplaced confidence, perhaps? Or maybe there was no choice at all. Which would be worse?

"The amount of Mist in the Sun-Cryst, if released all at once, if it is anything compared to this - it could be catastrophic. If it is out at sea, we would be luckier, but if it has been hidden inland… it might very well kill the Viera, sensitive as they are. I can't say what it would do to aught else, to humes or to magicks or the airships…"

"You have asked Venat about all this?"

"I am not sure what to ask. If it is anything… the Sun-Cryst is not a popular topic on the best of days. I doubt I would get an answer."

Cid's hand has drifted just below his throat, an unconscious gesture Vayne doubts he even realizes he is making, when he is most troubled or deep in thought. Tracing his fingers over the edge of the wedding ring he wears on a chain, tucked safely away from harm. Far too precious to wear otherwise, when he might be elbow deep in half-manufacted Nethicite with barely a moment of warning.

"Venat is not comfortable, when you are around. I think it is… troubled, that we are friends."

"Jealous?" An amusing thought, that. Vayne had always thought he was capable of irritating the gods, but had never expected to get such an opportunity.

"No. No, not of you - but more… the sense of it. Of not being alone."

This is not anything he has spoken of before, and Vayne's eyes narrow. "You can feel as it does?"

Cid waves a hand, as if in dismissal, but his expression is grim. "Barely. In passing, sometimes. It is…" He trails off. "Resignation, perhaps? Sorrow, without even death to limit it. As if… as if one had an eternity - only that and nothing more. Whatever happened, Vayne… the Occuria may have survived it, however it is that gods do so, but I do not believe they recovered. And for all I know, Venat is the sanest of those that remain."

"Not just gods, then, but _mad_ gods? You do always have the most glorious horrible ideas, doctor."

"Usually they have the decency to scale down a bit." Cid mutters. "Are we truly to succeed, where they failed? We are to be Venat's attempt at absolution? I believe I need a word, for when the regret is there before the attempt is even made."

"You knew better than to fly that antique of yours, before the wings fell off and it crashed into that mountain. What did you call it then?"

He meets the annoyed look with a smile. Cid knows full well when he is being baited, that he is not allowed to descend too far into grim deductions.

"It was a hill, not a mountain, and the theory was sound even if the struts were not. It was mostly repairable, anyway." He sighs. "The world is not an airship, Vayne. If I were capable of humility, this would be the time for it."

"We are not the hand that guides the weave of history, then?" Vayne would not trade what he has or what he is for fear, even if may be well justified. "If the gods do not favor us, we must make our own destiny, and that is it. Humility will do us little service against such opposition."

"Yes, and with all Archades in the balance. I just wish…"

One hand under his glasses, rubbing wearily at his eyes. Vayne has grown accustomed to the sudden strike of inspiration, can see it in the way Cid goes suddenly still, and any talk of fate or ego vanishes instantly. As if by some silent cue, he is at once all stark, excited gestures, one hand out and snapping in time with his words. "Wait. Wait wait wait. No, that's it. That's _it_."

Vayne steps quickly back, as Cid shoves books and papers away to clear a space, jotting down ideas at speed, and the sound of what he has come to think of as the doctor's thoughts, the abacus clicking frantically away, counterpoint to his swift notation.

"Venat? I think I've come up with a solution. At least half of it, but I do need… Yes. Yes, that will do. Hardly a grand solution but it might serve for the preliminary… Venat? Are you - yes, there you are. I need you to look over what I've just - I think it may be a matter of isolating… or perhaps - no, do you think?"

It is not so much the doctor's lunacy that annoys his enemies, as the blow to their egos to be so easily cast aside, the polite regard and deference instantly rendered as the fiction it is. Vayne doesn't mind - this is what Cid is, at his best, and he would never seek to check it. Better as well, to have him lost in inventing, in pushing the edge of what he can do than worried about what he ought not try - their enemies will not hesitate. Be it gods or men, they will come at Archades by any means possible, and there is little place for restraint in such a battle.

"Please do not him indulge in anything that requires me to replace the ceiling again." Vayne says to the empty air as he turns to leave, certain he has been heard.


	7. the good, unluckily 2

The western hall is in need of a new portrait, the last now nearly two years out of date, as neither Vayne nor Larsa have been much interested in slowing down long enough to allow for one. The rest of the space is lined with old Solidors, and Vayne has made more than one impromptu lesson out of the walk, entertaining Larsa with tales of battles won and honors granted while checking off the names in his own mind, the grand game of just which conquering titans of old walked around in ladies' undergarments. No paintings remain of his brothers, all of those destroyed when they were judged to be traitors. Every personal possession, every private document seized by the Judges or burned outright. A decent Firega can reduce a man's entire life to nothing in minutes.

Vayne has a single memstone remaining from his eldest brother, discovered months after the fact, tossed in randomly among his own possessions. It is nothing much, the notes from some long distant meeting, reminders for a day's activities that have less than no meaning now. He has nearly gotten rid of it half a dozen times, yet for some reason it remains, tucked in the back of a desk drawer, a compromise Vayne barely understands, though is only with himself.

He is not early, but Larsa still stumbles in late, trying to pretend as if he hasn't just run the length of the northeast corridor. He is freshly scrubbed and attired, and Vayne can see a slight red patch along the knuckles on his right hand, the scrape doused carelessly to heal.

"Who won, then?"

The look his brother gives him, as if he needs to ask, and Vayne reaches out to ruffle his hair but Larsa ducks away, laughing. Judge Magister Drace appears at the door, taking up a position near the wall, between them and the door. Which means his brother has likely been sparring with either her or Gabranth this afternoon, and she has nothing else to do at the moment than indulge in silently disapproving of his existence, as usual.

"Seven to four. I took three goals."

"Well done. You might be able to find a future in it, if you should tire of being a prince."

Larsa sits down, while Vayne remains standing, just slightly behind and to the side of the chair. Open sky behind them, as high as they are, though they've sat for this once before, and he knows the artist has already sketched the backdrop from a lower room, the Archadian skyline stretching out instead, the Senate pavilion - of all things - in full view, though it does have a certain grandeur despite the interior, much like the rest of Archades. The woman leans around her canvas, and Vayne can see her frowning slightly, because Larsa is fidgeting, tugging at the high collar that… no, starched lace? Really?

"Gods save us, brother. Who dressed you in that and why didn't you have the good sense to tell them no?"

Larsa scowls, two red spots high on his cheeks, though he is doing his best to pretend it is in insult rather than embarrassment. "It seemed a bit… excessive, but I… I did not wish to cause offense."

"If you don't put up a fight, they'll be coddling you like this forever." Even the servants reluctant to admit their precious charge is growing up. Vayne can sympathize, yet there is nothing to be done for it.

"Hold still."

He carries the dagger with him always, an easy weapon to conceal, especially here in the palace where it is considered bad form to walk around openly armed, no matter how many have come to a bloody end within its walls. It is too far a distance to hear if Drace's breath catches, the Judge Magister's armored form revealing nothing, not the slightest shift of movement. Vayne still imagines she is standing a bit more rigid, her eyes fixed to the fraction of space between the point of the dagger and Larsa's throat, as he delicately cuts the ridiculous trim off the collar. Of course his brother notices none of it, still a bit annoyed, all childish pride with no idea at all that there could be anything to fear. It is petty, to taunt her so, but Drace is the equal fool for ever rising to the bait.

"The Grand College took the match today. Are we going to the finals?"

"I should imagine so." Vayne says, knife back in its sheath as he leans away. Larsa flashes him a grateful grin, returning quickly to a poised alertness, the sort of formal stiffness that has Vayne longing to shove him over, far preferring an informal slouch over the reminder of what must be, how fast the time is passing. It feels no span at all, some days, since he had held Larsa in the crook of his arm and promised him the whole of the world.

"I have two jockeys who've petitioned to ride Zephyr in the Tchita Twelve-Turn." It is his brother's fastest bird, a brilliant white-gold, little more than two years old, and already a champion several times over. "Lord Bailean wishes to stud him with the hens in his flock, and says I can have my choice of the eggs."

"… and then you will finally have a chick of your own. Again. Remind me, how many birds before they stop being a flock and start petitioning for a seat in the court?"

Where he's standing, he can see Larsa struggle not to turn and glare at him, though his voice conveys the proper annoyance well enough.

"I only have eight, and Lai is too old now to do much but sleep in the sun. I am hardly neglectful."

"I would never presume it."

A messenger at the door, a little later than he'd expected. The message brings less progress than he'd assumed, Rasler's forces doing a fair job of holding their position even against Bergan's heavy assault. A young king, unexpectedly tossed into the fray, but he has the sense to listen to his veteran advisors. A few of those, though, are from Landis, and ought to know that the Empire will not stop, will never stop. Perhaps Nabradia had no choice but to pin themselves down, but the fortress will be a tomb in short order no matter its defenses. However many men Rasler has on that paling, Vayne very much doubts it will be enough.

He glances up, to find that Larsa has turned, watching him closely.

"It's nothing."

"No, it's not." Larsa doesn't look away, already the gaze, that cool, Solidor regard - and finally Vayne relents, handing the paper over.

"Your fault, lord brother." He says, all airy smugness, solemnity evaporating with the smile he can't quite hold back. "You are the one who taught me to pay attention."

"Brat."

It does not take long, though, for all amusement to fall away. It has been difficult, that he must always be the bearer of bad news for his little brother, that the world must continue to disappoint. Vayne is the one who taught Larsa about lying, about war and infidelity and theft in all its perfectly legal forms. That the citizens of his Empire can be cruel, or lazy, or fools, just like his enemies - who may only stand against him out of circumstance, rather than any ill intent. All of it necessary, all that the world would eventually bring to his door, though at least Vayne can be here now, to drag what is most ugly into the light, and show it plain.

"… this is wrong." Larsa says softly, and Vayne is gratified that he keeps his voice low, this conversation not even for Drace to overhear. "I understand… I have studied, and been told that this is not a decision anyone takes lightly - but truly, there must be a better way."

A blind spot, a flaw of familial trust, that Larsa will not ever find his father to be at fault, that his part in it must be only some grand mistake, a misunderstanding. Whatever Gramis might assume, Vayne would never force Larsa to choose between them. As far as he is aware, the Emperor has hewn to this unspoken truce as well, though out of honor or guilt or the fear Larsa would not choose him, there is no way of knowing.

Certainly, Gramis thinks Vayne has done it all to protect himself. Making Larsa a prince of the people, gentle and noble and unspoiled - and there is advantage in it, to be sure. Worth too much the way that he is, to ruin it all by turning him against Vayne now, and that is all the Emperor can see. As if there could be no other reason, that Vayne would fight to keep Larsa from being a murderer before he was even a man.

"It will be your turn soon enough, little brother, to help chart a new course for Archades. For now, you must pay attention. Observe who is troubled by such events, and more importantly, who is not. Which among the people welcome such conflicts, and see opportunity there - and how many do not even think of the war at all. If you are to desire peace, there are those whose self-interest, whose own goals - good or ill - demand they be your enemy. A thousand different reasons why a man might have to go to war, though he may wish for peace."

"Come back a Judge, or do not come back at all." Larsa murmurs, and Vayne wonders about the conversations he's been having with his friends, those young men just starting to realize the sorts of choices they will soon have to make, the kinds of lives they might be led into living. It is not uncommon, among the higher Houses, to place some very specific demands on their first sons and daughters, with the expectation that a second will be waiting, should they fail to live up to the challenge.

Judge Magister Drace herself comes from such a family, one brother dead at childbirth and the other a sickly, weak thing that did not live long into his adolescence. The common assumption that her father had killed him, worked him to death in an attempt ensure his legacy as Judge Magister stayed in the family. With his death, all obligation had fallen then on the first daughter, on Drace, and she had traded her debut in society for endless drills with the sword, a merciless regimen under the unforgiving eye of her father. Not as amazing that Drace had succeeded him in the position as that she came out of it with any personality left to speak of.

The mood lightens considerably, as Vayne shifts the conversation to less worrisome topics, and eventually he is left to relate the specifics of Draklor's new flying machine, and promising a visit and no, Larsa is not allowed to fly it. Ever. Not even if he promises to go at a crawl. The clock chimes, an hour-and-a-half later, and his brother rises from the chair, looking back with a half-worried, half-hopeful expression.

"I… there is a… party. A small gathering, and I have been invited. I ought prepare. The daughters of House Maignart have asked. Judge Drace needs not attend such a silly… but I thought, perhaps, that you might come?

Which means that Larsa's tried very hard to avoid being invited at all - rather difficult to do with attendants who do little more than receive invitations on his behalf - and now he needs his brother to be his excuse for leaving early.

"I believe I have no prior engagements."

Larsa smiles, thanks the artist and departs, with Drace a step or two behind. Vayne lingers for a moment, the painting much further along, a rather radiant quality to the light, and at the moment it is Larsa in full focus, with Vayne as a less-defined shadow in the background, like some spectre of ill conscience. A fair resemblance to the truth, some would say. The painter seems to notice where his attention falls, her smile carries an edge of apology.

"I thought it would be better to catch the young lord as best I could for now, and perhaps finish your portion alone, later. I know it can be difficult to ask those of his age to sit still for so long."

"A wise courtesy. I thank you."

Vayne is just about to make his goodbyes, when he notices a sketch from the corner of his eye, half-tucked under a palette. He tugs it free, hearing the woman inhale sharply, not quite panic, but no one has ever considered his extra attention a good thing. It is a fast sketch, of Vayne leaning down to speak to his brother, while Larsa has turned to look up at him, paying close attention. The particular expression of his, rendered perfectly, where he is weighing every word, though Vayne doesn't remember saying anything worth that much effort. His own gaze is… well, the woman is talented, but he is certain has never looked quite that content in all of his life.

Vayne will still ask to keep it, and she will say yes.

* * *

A few of the more enterprising mothers still set their daughters in his path, though Vayne's been unattached for so long it is as much a token gesture as anything, and were he to actually take an interest in a House's more promising first child, it would be interesting to see what the result might be.

Larsa, however, is dangerously close to being buried in girls, court opinion or simply maternal optimism that he is in higher regard with the Emperor than his older brother - so sweet, so handsome, so kind - and therefore the ultimate goal of any House with ambitions, which would be all of them. Vayne has seen this play out before, the machinations to gain his attention will be as careful and methodical as any military strategy, even if Larsa has yet to even look at a one of them with anything but polite regard. It seems possible that the final effect of all their work will simply end with Larsa fleeing in panic at the slightest sound of a rustling skirt.

House Maignart has a heavy presence within the court's most frivolous social circles, not even the sort of gossip with much political value. It is headed by a tedious lady with two quite pretty and equally tedious daughters, and a lord who has opted out of tediousness by showing up drunk and falling asleep on a comfortable chair in the corner of the room. Ah, nobility.

On his arrival, all the expected overeager and rushed greetings. Compliments on how handsome and refined his little brother is and how good he looks dancing with whichever daughter Vayne is supposed to find more worthy of - perhaps, one day, a more private interlude? He is polite and says a number of meaningless things no one is listening to anyway, and then he is free to move to a secluded corner and be treated like furniture by the brightly-clad flock of attendees who are little more than half his age and make him feel three times as old. It must be what Cid feels like, with every new batch of graduates a little younger, marking yet another passing year.

"Quickly. Hide me."

Vayne turns a little as Larsa ducks around him, his back mostly to the room, which will block his brother from view for approximately no time at all, but he is obligated to at least make the attempt.

"I must say, it is not unlike watching some very odd-colored hounds course a hare. You are all still in one piece, I hope?"

Larsa rolls his eyes, a disgruntled, long-suffering grin that only Vayne is privileged to see. He wonders if there is a girl among those out there on the floor that will be of any use in keeping his brother from burning out completely before he reaches twenty-five.

Vayne gestures to the far wall, away from the festivities. "Around the corner here, there is a window, and just outside that is a very convenient tree. I say we make our escape, and perhaps you can show me how you manage that one-handed turn at speed without tipping your bird or breaking your neck."

He deserves the annoyed look, for daring to suggest Larsa rides like gravity is negotiable. "It's not that difficult."

"Then it shouldn't take long for you to teach me."

A slight smile. "I hear civilized people prefer to use the door."

"Civilized people take two hours to say their goodbyes."

As if on cue, a girlish cry cuts through the air, absurdly overdramatic. "Lord Larsa? Where have you gone?"

He cringes.

"Ten minutes."

High, light laughter and the smell of expensive, imported roses and a pair of delicate hands wrap around his brother's arm, tugging him back into the fray. Larsa's expression shifts even as he turns, back to what is only polite and gracious and Vayne doesn't have to worry about any romantic flights of fancy quite yet, at least not from anyone in this room. He returns to paying vague attention to this week's popular if uninspired waltz, and the footsteps of the young dancers, some obviously more studious than truly interested, others making up for less attentive practice with great enthusiasm.

"You are very indulgent with him."

"He has never given me reason to regret it."

One of those rare occasions, where he speaks before he looks, though the voice is unfamiliar and it even takes Vayne a moment to place the face. Fair enough, dark eyes and long, dark hair, currently bound up in a long train of mourning black, and it's easy enough to know her then.

"Good afternoon, milady."

Thea Akaste Iachnel, of House Iachnel, all of whom are mourning the sudden death of their father, Senator and patriarch. A rare thing, the airship crash that had cost him his life, but even rarer that it didn't seem to be intentional. Not even from within the family - Iachnel was surprisingly tight-knit for such an old House, holding no small amount of sway within the Senate practically from its inception, but rather quiet about it all, disappearing into the background simply by measure of sanity and solidarity.

"All Archades mourns with you in the passing of your father."

A slight smile, accepting the courtesy. If her grief is false she is remarkably good at the charade, a pale fragility in her manner, that she looks calm and composed now only due to a conscious effort. It is convincing enough, that Vayne follows the empty politeness with a more personal truth.

"I must say, we did not tend to agree, but it never seemed to bother either of us."

A real smile then, fond and remembering and not at all for him. "He liked you. You caused trouble, and made him work for what he wanted. It cleared away some obstacles, those people who preferred easy gains."

A lie, but very well delivered. If she wishes to play at polite conversation, Vayne can serve as an obliging partner.

"I hope the Senate has given you a fair welcome, in light of the unexpected circumstance."

"I am honored that I would be considered worthy of my father's seat." No real surprise that it passed down so easily. As much as the Senate adores beating their breasts over centuries of Solidor rule, there are very few Houses that ever cede power once they have attained it. "My eldest brother remains the head of our House, but he prefers to keep with his business in the North."

Alras Kilvarin Iachnel could have easily ranked Judge Magister, if he hadn't absconded for the wilds the moment he'd finished at the Akademy. A joke among most of upper Archades, that the Senator's son had gone feral, spent his days fighting bears and biting the heads off fish and running with the same wolves that bared their fangs upon the Iachnel crest. He'd even raised a pack of his own half-wild children, all presumed to be bastards, certainly not a one of them possessing any actual sense of civility. A good deal of presumption, all resting on the fact that none of them had ever bothered to come to Archades, that it was the city that had rejected them and not, perhaps, the opposite.

House Iachnel's northern lands encompassed a vast, rich country: mining and timber and considerable resources, and they were careful, protective stewards. Bergan had made an attempt to negotiate a new border only a few years ago, an incursion that could have been quite profitable for him, but it had not gone very well at all. He might have been as much beast as man, but Alras knew how to hold on to what was his.

"I would ask you to dance but I fear I don't know the steps." Vayne says, and Thea grimaces slightly, clearly choosing his corner to be out of the way as well, rather than try to draw him into the festivities.

"I don't believe they do either."

The girl currently dancing with Larsa has managed to put her feet down on anything _but_ the dance floor, though there is barely the flicker of strain in his brother's smile. It might be necessary to find him a pair of steel-toed boots, like the ship hands wear, if this is to be his foreseeable future. A few shy stragglers hover at the edge of the dance floor, too nervous or held back by their attendants, along with those who prefer to gossip behind fluttering fans. A young man stands alone near the entrance, though the girls outnumber the boys and there is nothing particularly wrong with him, perhaps not quite old enough yet or perhaps simply not Larsa - there are surely girls here who will dance - or have been told to dance - with the Emperor's son or none at all.

"My little brother." Thea says, and again if her affection is at all feigned it is well done. "This is the first season he has been much out in the court. He was sickly as a child, and chafes now beneath the constant attention of his sisters. I do believe he considers Lord Larsa to be all that is enviable, especially his seat on a chocobo, and he is… a bit afraid of the beasts, though he would die of embarrassment to hear me say it."

"My brother has every intention of taking a new egg to raise. I doubt it would be difficult for him to acquire another, though I warn you he is quite particular with their care. He will not think well of anyone who shirks their duties, even if they should become tiresome."

Or disgusting. Vayne remembers vividly when a pretty hen, the blue-green of uncut gemstones, had suddenly fallen quite ill, and it had seemed she would be lost. Larsa had been determined to nurse her himself, even when he'd ended up wearing most of the medicine he'd tried to get down her throat. The bird had survived, though Larsa had required two baths to stop smelling of wet feathers and stable muck, and Vayne was fairly certain they'd just burned the clothes.

"It was the particular wish of our father, that my brother be taught to earn what he would desire. With any luck, it will keep him from the worst sorts of folly." Thea's eyes meet his, steady and sure. "We expect great things from him. It is something I believe we have in common."

No such thing, as an idle conversation between a Senator's daughter and an Emperor's son, and to bring his brother anywhere near the matter means she is either innocent or incredibly stupid and Senators are never innocent, even the new ones. Vayne regards her for a long moment, and she allows it without comment or apparent concern, her tone light and conversational when she speaks again, though the words are not nearly so meaningless.

"In light of the sure victory over Nabradia, I am surprised Draklor would ask for such a pittance of an increase."

Vayne turns away, keeping his gaze to the rest of the room. Larsa is dancing again with one of the Maignart girls, while their mother looks on with what would be called hope were it less openly predatory.

"I believe there are few of your fellow Senators that would consider it so."

"Enough that it will pass, with my support."

It is a rare Senator that would even stand in the same room with him, let alone with what actually sounds like a peace offering, a gesture of goodwill. It isn't possible. None of them would ever break ranks to get close to him, not like this, not at all worth the risk. Vayne glances around, but he can see no one taking any particular notice. It is too silly, this children's dance, far too frivolous an affair for any real business to take place.

Perhaps the reason she is here now.

"How long had you been training for a Senate seat, before this?"

It is meant as a caution - this is not how things are done, do not pretend you are unaware - yet she remains perfectly composed.

"It has not been long. I have a great deal to learn, I admit - but I have always been instructed, since my earliest days, of how best I might serve my family. House Iachnel has ever found it wise to bend as the world changes, my lord, rather than struggle against it in futility." Thea is not watching him either, her gaze distant, voice calm and cool. "I will not lie, I would it were I had my father back, and we were not speaking now, yet I am here and there is the future to consider, for my House and for all Archades."

House Iachnel is extremely tight-knit, and successful because of it, though not as much as might be possible, were they to reach for more. Sisters well married, cousins and nephews as bankers and mages, scholars and even a Judge here and there, if Vayne remembers right, and overlooked only as they had never made a run on the throne. Yet.

"In any future, there are always opportunities for those seeking glory."

Thea smiles. "Glory casts a considerable light, your Grace. My father believed that humble labors bring their own rewards, even if they be unseen and unsung."

Why bother risking a battle for a throne, when it is easier _not_ to have it - to profit in the background, to be invisible among the rise and fall of more ambitious men, and let another House stand as the target? Maintain neutrality, and grow ever richer with as small a risk as possible. It is completely mercenary, and matches to what he knows of Iachnel's past - and is as yet the best suggestion she might not entirely be lying.

"I fear I can offer little you will find modest, lady. If the Senators have not made their opinion of me plain, you need but wait."

Maybe the slightest hesitance in her expression, like a man at the game board, confident yet aware he sets out a piece that cannot be withdrawn.

"It is not the right of nervous old men, to seek immortality by chaining themselves to the young. If a man is drowning, and you cannot save him, you must free yourself, whatever the cost. It is no virtue, to be dragged down as well. I am not the only one who thinks it so."

It is high treason, then, that they are trying to hang around his neck, the Senate using her to draw him in - but that is giving them considerable credit, more initiative than they have ever shown before. The alternative is no less believable, that she has just made the first overture toward a tentative alliance. At the very least suggesting there are those amenable to a changing of the guard. How interesting.

"Lord Brother, there you are! There was… I mean, we had something to… discuss?" A hasty bow to Lady Iachnel, the look in Larsa's eyes more than a little urgent, and Vayne bows to her as well.

"Yes. If you will excuse us."

"Good day," she says politely, though it is clear she is confused, since they're not going anywhere near the door. Perhaps it is best to let her see him play the fool to the hilt, before she makes up her mind about wishing to put any further faith in his abilities.

The Senate will have to be dealt with, Vayne has known it for some time. Only tolerating his father as long as they have because they can see the end in sight, and believe their patience will finally be rewarded. Undoubtedly advising Gramis against giving him the throne, and there is every chance he will heed them, and so Vayne's life would be shortened to a matter of opportunity. Larsa would serve their needs admirably well, or at least they would assume so, and then he would voice an opinion they did not want to hear and then he would be dead.

The only nightmare Vayne has ever had. Of being chained away in some dungeon while the crowds gather and the executioner sharpens his sword - quick and clean, he knows well enough how it goes. Larsa would walk with his head held high, because Vayne never taught him to be proud but he is a Solidor and Solidors bow to no one. His brother would give them nothing, noble to the very end.

Vayne always wakes up then, with half the shout still on his lips, wrists aching from imagined chains and the vow that he will kill them all for this, he will see Archades burn and he will kill them all.

It would be far less dangerous, to only cut away what had to be sacrificed, while leaving the structure intact. A Senate more amenable to compromise, or at least not entirely hostile to their Emperor. If Iachnel were truly serious, if there were others who shared her view - a Senate privately allied with House Solidor would be the sort of security his ancestors could only dream of.

It also is the sort of temptation an ambitious senator might throw out in front of him, that Vayne would make a mistake and she could only profit from it. Lady Iachnel is at a disadvantage, a young woman in an old man's game, and perhaps the offer is nothing more than the hope it might raise her standing among her fellows. Nothing to do in the near future but wait and see what happens next. He can afford to be patient, if she wishes only for the length of rope necessary to hang herself.

Vayne slides the window open, carefully reaching for the nearest branch, though it is quite solid and holds steady beneath his weight, easy to swing out to a proper foothold. Larsa makes an impatient sound behind him, but it isn't long before they're both dangling in the air like proper idiots. It's been a few years since he's bothered climbing out a window, and his boots are too fancy for the proper grip. Larsa is still up near the wall, perfectly secure with his knees on the branch and his arms yanking on the top of the pane.

"Problems, brother?"

"It won't move!"

Inside, the music comes to a halt, the dance finishing to the sound of light applause. Vayne cannot see much from where he's managed to climb, the tree not particularly high but the branches twisted at odd angles. A shame, it would be interesting to see what the senator thinks of this, but at the moment it's a bit more worrying how loud the branches are creaking, as Larsa continues in his futile attempt at closing the window.

"Leave it, then. Better an imperfect escape than none at all."

Sky pirate logic, if such a thing exists. The last time Balthier had been caught, from what the papers said, he had been hanging half out a window himself, though wearing nothing but a smile and his assurance it was all simply a misunderstanding.

Vayne can only imagine the subsequent escape had been quite... memorable.

His brother finally relents, scrambling quickly down - and this is all a good deal more fun than it ought to be. The sort of thing he never got to do much of at his brother's age - and had he even noticed then, that there was no one to accompany him on these sorts of adventures? Had it ever seemed as obvious as it does now, how the Emperor had deliberately kept him isolated? Nowhere to go. No one to ask for guidance, if he'd even known what to ask.

Once, when he was very young, it seemed his father was capable of anything. An intricate planner, an architect of all fates. It is all but inevitable that Vayne will meet only what is left of the man he'd like to face, when things take their final turn. A shadow fueled by nothing but paranoia and far too much compounded guilt gone sour with time.

"Go! She's coming! Faster!"

A good thing it isn't so much a private garden as a bit of unremarkable green space, a simple terrace, so there's no one around to see them, as Vayne reaches for a place to brace his weight just as Larsa steps on his hand and with a hiss and a truncated yelp and the snap of a few minor branches Vayne plummets to the ground without any hint of grace, landing flat on his back just in time for his brother to fall on top of him, elbow solid in his gut, and he'd grunt if he could manage the breath for it.

Larsa scrambles toward the base of the tree, hiding behind it, Vayne content to stay where he is, mostly covered by the overhang of a low shrub. He tries quietly to catch his breath, spitting out half a leaf, gloriously undignified. Larsa's eyes are bright, a hand over his mouth to keep quiet, glancing from him and up and back again.

"Lord Larsa?"

The girl's voice grows louder, likely standing at the window, though he can't see her. Poor thing, nothing in her tutelage to handle the idea of well-born sons of Archades flinging themselves out of windows. Vayne really ought to be ashamed of himself.

"Lord Larsa? Where have you gone?"

His brother's shoulders shake with silent laughter. As young as he is it is still supremely satisfying to act against what is reasonable, to break with expectations. Only more of those to come, less to smile about with each new obligation, and all too soon a day when Larsa won't remember what it was when life seemed simple. A few moments later, they hear the sound of the window falling shut.

"I believe they call that a successful escape." Vayne says, the silence now only marked by a bit of wind in the leaves. So quiet, it is hard to imagine they are all but in the center of the city. It will be dark soon, already the light is a golden wash along the side of the buildings. From the right angle, the palace will shine as brightly as the sun.

"I ought to apologize, later." Larsa says, looking back up.

"I'll accept it now." Vayne replies, raising an affronted brow at the withering glare. "You did land on me. I believe I may have even ripped my coat."

"Heaven forbid, lord brother. How shall you go on?"

Sarcasm, another side to his brother that only Vayne gets to see. Larsa is afraid to wield it in public, worried over court opinion, that he is setting a proper example, that it is unkind - but he is free to be whoever he wants here, with his older brother as his only audience. If it is only that Vayne's sins, what he has done and what he is capable of are greater and more terrible than anything Larsa can dream - well, at least some good has come of it at last.

"We ought go in, before it gets too late." Vayne says, but the ground is comfortable and he is in no hurry to move. His brother idly twists a dandelion free, crushes the tuft in his hand and opens his palm into the wind, watching the tiny seeds float free.

"Has the battle ended, then?"

He does not look at Vayne. An attempt at being casual that fools no one.

_You had your chance. The chance to keep him innocent and useless and happy, and you chose this instead_. Or perhaps it was ever Larsa's destiny. No choice, there was never a real choice - and yet, should anything happen, should he suffer some terrible fate Vayne cannot see coming, it will not much matter if he did what he could, if he did his best for his little brother. It will not matter at all.

"No word yet, though I expect it shortly. Rest easy - this is not your fight, and none of the responsibility rests with you." Keep his hands clean, for as long as he possibly can. "You must always do what you are able, but no one expects you to put all the world to rights. At least, not today."

"Archades is not peaceful, even when she is at peace." Larsa says quietly, not looking to him for answers or reassurance. "I will find another way. I must."

Vayne does not believe in gods that bless the acts of men, and even if it were so, he does not merit their beneficence by any means. Yet still the bargain, practically a prayer, fierce as ever for what he knows he has no right to ask for and does not deserve.

Just let him do this. Let him make this one thing in the world right and good, and better than it was before, and he will ask for nothing else, and the world may do as it will with him.

* * *

The sun sets, and there is no message, and time passes and there is still nothing, and now Archades is a sea of hazy lights, the windows mostly reflecting the brightness of the room and Vayne is pretending to read while waiting for word of the battle, listening to a very talented and quite lovely woman play the violin. It is a piece he recognizes, though the exact name escapes him – she has played it before, knows it is one of his favorites - and he watches her body twist slightly through the long, drawn notes, hair falling past her shoulders, loose curls like the fanciest of formal script, dark against her pale skin.

Vayne is not so far gone, not as inhuman as some would believe, that he cannot appreciate her charms, or imagine enjoying her company. The offer from her father has come long since - she will not wed if he would like her for his mistress, though he pays her handsomely just to hear her play.

Who knows just how much more she receives from the Emperor, to speak of all that she might see or hear?

In the service of his father, all but from the moment he had summoned her to play for him, along with two of his footmen, likely his valet, the head groom, his fencing instructor, his tailor - it goes on. Larsa's valet as well, though Vayne had made a decent case where the man's true loyalties ought to stand, and given that he'd done so while holding him by the front of his coat from the balcony of the fifty-eighth floor of the palace, Vayne thought he'd been well understood.

The sonata ends, and the violinist lowers her instrument, flexing her bow hand, her smile all that is gracious and inviting, and even to think of kissing her is to imagine his father listening to the report of it, and the thought makes Vayne unimaginably weary. If he were to take a wife it would be much the same - if she did not belong to Gramis from the start he would surely find a way - and gods forbid there were any children, that he be forced to weigh the life of his own blood against his brother's chance to rule. His child stands no chance, even as a hypothetical Vayne knows this, and the last thing in this world he ever wishes to be is a father. So much easier, that things remain as they are, the world complicated enough as it is. If Gramis wishes to strike at him, he will have to do it under his own power. Vayne is no longer obliged to provide the ammunition.

"I am sorry to keep you so long." He says, before she can begin the next piece, ready to dismiss her, and seek out what word he can on his own. It will be another day in Nalbina, perhaps, if the paling has lasted this long. He gives them a week at the very most. Every hour, another opportunity for Raminas to make his stand.

"It is an honor as ever, my lord. If you would like-" Whatever she is going to say is lost, as his messenger finally appears. The violinist bows, and takes her leave quietly, the door closing behind her as Vayne opens what he quickly realizes is the final report, a letter that really ought to be far longer for all that it contains.

So very simple, isn't it, in the end? No matter how great the battle, or how much is at stake, the end is always simple. Vayne himself will be a few lines on a page, someday. The whole of the Empire cut down to a passing mention, in some old book that no one ever reads.

He sits down, and goes over the report once more, as the world finally slows to an unfortunate crawl, the race over before it ever began.

"You got me my funding. You magnificent bastard."

Cid is all barely-checked excitement, bursting into the room, quite obviously hasn't stopped moving since Vayne left him. Neither of them keep anything like normal hours much of the time, so nearly all of Cid's impromptu visits take place long after nightfall. Usually when he is in such a mood, all but bubbling over with some discovery he cannot keep to himself, though now it's clear he's come to Vayne for the full story of his unexpected success.

"I just got the word that it will go through. I don't know how in the hell you managed it so fast. Do I even ask, or would I rather not know?" The clink of glasses, a bottle being shifted to his open hand. "I've been told this is extremely expensive champagne, from… some place I can't pronounce. You're not supposed to be able to get it across the border. Nothing like a man from Balfonheim who owes a favor."

"Nalbina is ours," Vayne says, tonelessly, "and Rasler of Nabradia has been killed in the battle."

House Solidor has not deigned to enter combat since the time of Vayne's great-grandfather. It is simply not done, would be considered a vote of no confidence against the vast Imperial forces for their leaders to actually set foot on the battlefield. A strange conceit, really. If Vayne were given leave to fight his father might be rewarded with his dearest wish, that he have only one heir for the throne.

Cid sets the bottle down. "What response from Dalmasca?"

"None."

"Nothing. No word at all? "Raminas must know-"

"-that we've widowed his daughter? I imagine he must, by now."

The doctor is pacing now, as he does, all thought of celebration forgotten. "… and he does _nothing_?"

"For now." It is but a pause, not a stalemate and not even a regrouping - what will Dalmasca have to regroup with? Attacking the fortress had been meant to shatter their resolve, and it seems Archades has succeeded even beyond their expectations.

"… I suppose we didn't manage to hold the body?"

"Of course not. Nabradia's king will be buried in Dalmascan soil, and the princess will no doubt be married off to Rozarria as soon as her father can make the match with one of Margrace's heirs. Unless he gives her away to the Marquis first."

An interesting bit of trivia, how the bloodlines of so many noble houses are twisted together in unexpected places. Go far back enough on Ondore's line, and it does indeed share a few branches with House Solidor. No one is particularly pleased about this.

The door slips open with barely a sound, another servant on the threshold, pausing until he is impatiently waved in. Cid is frozen with his back to the door, watching over his shoulder as Vayne retrieves more unpleasant news from a small silver tray. Both thinking the same thing, _this_ is the notice that Raminas has finally remembered he has the means to end the war. This is the alliance between Dalmasca and Bhujerba _and_ Rozarria and hell, at least Vayne can worry about any daggers in his back for the foreseeable future - they'll _need_ him now, that much is damned-

He stops, fingers brushing over the green wax seal that bears the twin serpent Solidor crest, edges dusted in gold - direct from the Emperor's own hand. Vayne is sketching out a dozen plans to defend himself before he ever breaks the wax, eyes flicking over the contents, tossing it into the fire before his father's man has even shut the door behind him. It says nothing, and everything. As always.

Cid is still watching. Vayne rubs the bridge of his nose, lets out a slow breath. He feels very tired, and yet a part of him is tense and ready, could leave tonight, right now, to finish things as soon as possible.

"We are to offer a treaty of peace with King Raminas, should he agree to surrender."

"Surrender what? The Shards?"

As if any mention of them will _ever_ be written down. "Fables, Cid. Legends. Archades does not go to war over fairy tales."

"It is no treaty then."

"We can ill afford one, by any terms. Raminas may be fixed in his determination not to strike, whatever his reasons may be, but Rozarria will petition him harder than ever now, and his daughter's tears may well weaken his resolve over time. She was barely wed." Vayne pauses. "Do you think they were in love?"

"Who is to say?"

It makes little difference - it is done, and it will continue much the same. Far more than one man killed in the battle today, more than one widow that will feel no comfort in sharing the same grief tonight. Families on both sides, preparing to make swift and careful preparations to soothe the souls of the dead, and it will all, as ever, go on.

"To bring the body of her husband as our wedding gift. Were I in her place, such an thing would never fade." And that if it were only as insult. Only simple duty between Rasler and his bride, an ill-considered alliance without any real affection. If it had been otherwise?

Ask him what he would do, had it been Dalmasca's victory, and Larsa's body on some cold stone bier.

"The Emperor has made his wishes known. He believes it too great a risk to leave Raminas open to act, or his daughter free to be the link in a new alliance. He wishes to find a solution, as quickly as possible. End the line of the Dynast-King here, and the threat… and of course, it ought appear as if it was an act of insurrection, rather than Archadian involvement."

"Dalmasca murder their own king? Why the sudden need for theatre?"

"Archades no longer holds faith in the Marquis of Bhujerba, that his self-interest is enough to ensure his loyalty. Rightly so, Rozarria would gladly offer him any number of favors, should he side with them openly. It is tasked to me, then, to deliver up such an… encouragement for his continued support." No matter what happens, it will be easier than it ought to be. He has a talent. "I am again in the jesses, and will fly."

If he should fail, if it should go wrong, Gramis would surely enjoy being able to deny all culpability. Claim Vayne had been acting entirely of his own accord, and watch the last great threat to his reign perish in a spectacular fall to earth. The very best kind of weapon, highly skilled and completely disposable.

Cid frowns, contemplating, though they have moved into subjects far more to Vayne's particular set of skills.

"It seems unlike him, to trust you."

"I am certain he will be watching. Surely it is not without risk, but I am far too useful for the purpose and he has little other choice. Who else can give him what he needs? Bergan?"

"Perhaps Raminas truly knows nothing. Even Venat may be mistaken."

Vayne shakes his head. "Whatever it is that stays his hand, I do not believe the king to be a fool - he knows where the Sun-Cryst is, if anyone in this world still does."

"Doubtful he will be persuaded that we wish to eradicate it, when I cannot convince myself of the fact."

"He will be persuaded it will save his life, and the life of his daughter, to give it over, and beyond that - we shall see."

No need to follow the Emperor's plans, not if he can get that power in his hands - and Vayne can, and will. What then? Hold the Sun-Cryst long enough, at least to deal with his father, and make sure Rozarria knows to mind their manners?

A coronation gift for Larsa. A new age of peace. It does not seem such a terrible ambition.

Vayne pushes himself out of the chair, forcing back the surge of checked ambition, all that former urgency slipping into new plans, new strategies. The doctor shakes his head in grim amusement.

"It seems a far sight saner to treat with him, than the alternative. Silence the Marquis _and_ commit regicide without detection? Of course you already have an answer, I am sure."

Vayne takes the bottle, the cork popping hollow rather than festive, here in this quiet room, with very little left to celebrate.

"Did you know Judge Gabranth has a brother?"

Cid raises a brow, taking the proffered flute. "It signifies?"

"It might."

Vayne pours himself a full glass, with every intention of finishing the bottle and likely finding another, whether Cid is game or no. All will continue on as it has, any hope of solid gains pushed forward a month, six months, and he must be patient but there is hardly a need for him to meet the start of it sober.

The flute is cold in his hand, tiny bubbles tracing upward paths through a hint of gold. He smiles, all too easy to think of a proper toast, and raises the glass.

"To better men."


	8. just a man failing to reappear

In their eighteenth year, those who are to wear Dalmasca's crown, the blood heirs to the Dynast-King's legacy, are taken in secret, in silence by the ruler they will one day replace, to the tomb of King Raithwall himself. Escorted along its passages, deep down into what is as much palace as crypt, built to honor the legacy of the greatest lord of perfect peace that Ivalice has ever known.

At the heart of this sacred place lies the Dawn Shard. The ancient relic granted to Dalmasca's heirs, to the Dynast-King's lineage. A weapon of immeasurable power, proof of the right to rule, proof of Raithwall's wisdom and mercy.

In their eighteenth year, each future king or queen takes up the Dawn Shard.

And learns the truth.

* * *

It is so quiet. Were it any other night, Raminas would already be asleep. Or relaxing at his desk, finishing up some minor piece of business, reading from one or another of his favorite books. He has always been an old man, even in his youth a quiet kind of prince, prone to few fits of passion. A bit dull, perhaps, but if he had not been charismatic then at least he had been careful, and attentive, and his people had seemed pleased with his service.

In the end, it had simply not been enough.

A kindness, that few scribes of history ever see fit to imagine the fears of a king. However he will be remembered, as martyr or traitor or villain - perhaps ineffectual to the last - at least there will be none to mark the fact that he has never been all that brave. Raminas is frightened, and unsure, and even at this late hour, even as king and father he is still simply a man trembling in the pull of destiny.

Nabudis is gone. He knows how, though the why… an intended strike, or an accident? The plague hit Dalmasca hard, harder than Nabradia, and took so many of those brave soldiers who may have been able to defend her. If it had not… who knows? Perhaps it would have been Rabanastre with its people rendered less than dust.

If the Empire is truly so far gone, for such a pre-emptive, brutal attack, does any hope remain? Or is it his country's destiny to meet its end between two titans, splintered to pieces as they lock swords and battle to the finish?

Raminas runs his hands slowly along the smooth, sculpted stone of the windowsill, a beautiful swirl of rich, plum shades, the air perfumed with jasmine and desert olive from the gardens outside. He can remember standing here as a child, as a young man, with all the days of his life ahead of him. So many years, so much love and joy and pain. Struggle and uncertainty, even though his reign had been a quiet one, as such things went - he was a good king, wasn't he? It was peace, for as long as possible he had worked for peace.

Gods, but he will miss his life.

He moves around his room like a man in a dream, touching the back of a chair, a cabinet, picking up a small paperweight - a droplet of glass, blue flowers frozen inside - as if he had never truly seen it before. Raminas breathes, and every breath brings him closer to what seems now some predetermined end, each one a countdown and that is a frightening thought indeed. Near the far window, he undoes a latch on a brass cage with the barest whisper of a sound, letting the small, white birds inside fly out the window, into the gardens. Free.

He will surrender. He will give Archades everything, open the gates, kneel and lay tribute at their feet. No airship barrages, to blast through the walls that still echo with the sound of his daughter's young footsteps, no great armies to tear down the trees where he used to sit and listen to his mother sing. It will stand unharmed, the fountain where he kissed his wife for the first time. Did she love him? He thought they might have come close, over time, never quite a true and perfect romance, but maybe...

Does she know what he must do? Is she waiting for him, even now?

A small brazier warms the corner of the room, and one by one, he slowly burns the missives from Rozarria. Each one more fervent than the last, since the destruction of Nabudis. All but demanding his assistance, that he give up the Dusk Shard, that he retrieve the Dawn Shard - that this battle can be fought and won if only he would _act_. Yes, it is a limited weapon - one strike, two at the most, yet placed at the heart of the Empire it would be a crippling blow, and Rozarria would be quick to take their advantage. War would never reach Dalmasca's borders - Nabradia could be reclaimed, restored.

Heaven help him, that he's considered it. Long nights spent, knowing where such a thing must lead, and still, even now…

After Rasler's death, they challenged his heartlessness rather than his cowardice. How dare he stand by and let Nabradia's heir fall so gallantly in battle - his daughter's husband, long betrothed - and do nothing? Does he intend to let the Archadians simply walk in and take everything? Does he have no pride?

Raminas burns those letters too, watching the paper blacken, bits of ash rising in the heat haze. Ashelia will never forgive him, he is well aware, for not saving her husband or her land or her people. She will never forgive him and she will never understand just why he has betrayed them all.

It is all that matters, that she never understand.

He had wanted it to be his grandchild, Ashelia and Rasler's heir to take the journey down into the tomb. A grandson, perhaps, strong and brave and prepared for such a burden. A selfish, foolish notion, to spare his daughter - Ashe, his precious child, his world - and now with her husband dead there is no choice. Wrapped in mourning robes, wandering the halls at late hours in silent misery, lost to comfort or consolation with the enemy at their gates. If she were to know the truth now…

It has been their sin to bear for centuries, the nightmares of his father, and his father's father. If this is to be the end of Dalmasca, of the land of the Dynast-King, then by the gods let that grief die as well. He has kept it from her, against his vows Raminas has sworn himself to secrecy - he will _never _let this be his daughter's sin to bear. Let them kill him a thousand times and let every citizen of Dalmasca spit on his mangled bones, they will not have her.

He burns the single letter from Ondore, a simple missive of condolence on the surface, for the loss of a son-in-law, but coded with urgency, pleading with him to side with Rozarria, to see reason, to take up arms. It must be Archadian blood or the blood of his own people shed, even if he surrenders there is no reason to believe in mercy from the Empire - and still, he chooses to side with the enemy? Ondore is too clever to call him traitor to his own throne, yet the implication is there. The suggestion that Bhujerba is willing to commit to rebellion if Raminas provides his support, and if it is not enough, if even the Dawn Shard and the Dusk Shard cannot halt the Empire's thirst for conquest -

Raminas shudders. Oh, such shadows in the hearts of men, and Ondore has been friend and ally as long as any he has known. He cannot even spirit the Dusk Shard to safety, there is no one he can trust.

Perhaps it is right, though, that it remain within the palace. A spiteful, ugly part of him hopes very much that the Empire will find it, and more - that the great houses of Arcahdes would get their dearest wish for power and choke on it. Let them be so greedy, to find the Sun-Cryst itself - let them discover it and let it crush them beneath its weight for the next age. See if they can so easily bear the burden.

_**You are troubled, oh great king. Why do you sigh so? Why do you mourn?**_

The last of the letters crumbles to gray and black powder in the bottom of the brazier, and Raminas pokes absently at the ashes, stirring a few small, red-gold embers. He does not look up. He does not need to.

"I had thought you would come earlier."

Smooth and confident voices in the darkness, ever watching. Touch the Dawn Shard and learn, and the ageless undying will speak of what is past, and what ought be, and obligation and birthright and power, always power. It is to the young the Occuria present their strongest arguments - after ten years of ignoring them, they barely bothered him at all. It is only now, as Rozarria roars and Archadia presses its advantage, that they have come again to petition him yet again.

**_Dynast-Lord, why have you not called for us? We are here to help you. We are your servants, treaty-bound._**

Of course they could help him. Raminas might even fool himself into believing it is necessary, that he has no choice. Doubtful, that they would render up the treaty blade at this late hour - and even if it were his grasp, he could not trust himself. He cannot stand alone with the Sun-Cryst, and all that he knows, and all that might be, and still be sure that he could destroy it.

**_Take what is rightly yours. You will stand in glory, evermore. Your people will praise your name, and Dalmasca shall rule justly over all, once again. As it ought be._**

Raminas hears the light, childish giggle from the hall - and he ought know better than to look. The Occuria are pressing their advantage, he is a frightened old man, and no one in Dalmasca will praise him for his choice. He will go to his death as a traitor to his people, and even they will not know the whole of it.

So now he is given this gift, a vision of the world where he has chosen victory. A child, his granddaughter - another, his grandson, and yet another. A long procession of heirs in the false daylight of this beautiful dream, parading down the hall, the youngest unable to keep straight and solemn, admonished by their elder siblings - he can see himself in them, see all the great kings of Dalmasca.

His daughter steps into view, Ashelia reborn, resplendent in fine silks, in jewels and gold - she is a Queen, of a nation that stands at the head of the world. No one to oppose her, none who do not bow to her, and free to have chosen a new consort, to find love again. Smiling brightly - Raminas has not seen her smile since Nalbina fell.

He could be here. It could be this world, now. All that he wants, all that is fair and just and right. The Empire is greedy and base, and why not punish them for their hubris? He has been a good ruler, a good man. Such victory is no less than he deserves.

As if there are not men in Archades, who love their daughters too. As if he does not know the cost of paradise.

"You know I will not seek the Sun-Cryst, yet it end the line of Dalmasca. The vows I made were never to you."

The future vanishes like a snuffed flame, and the world is dark around him, and the shadows have eyes.

**_You will reject us, and prove yourself a false king? When we offer the only path to your salvation?_**

"At a price no one has the right to pay. It was wrong, e'er to use the Sun-Cryst's might. It was unforgivable, and if this is how we must be free of it - of you, at last…"

_**You will lose all that you have ever known. Dalmasca will fall, and perish, and be forgotten.**_

"Surely, you of all have seen great empires rise, diminish and disappear. The fate of all, even those that may conquer us today. It is not folly, to believe anything will last forever?"

Raminas knows what he is saying, and knows as they do, that if Ashelia never touches the Shard, then any memory of their existence will likely vanish forever into oblivion, old tales rendered more myth than history. The Occuria may be as gods - undying, eternal - yet they will be consigned only to watch, helpless and unremembered as the future leaves them behind.

**_Your daughter will be torn to pieces by Archadian wolves. Imagine how they will ravage her. Imagine how she will scream._**

It is a very low blow, intended only to hurt, and gods how it does. Raminas cannot move from the pain of such a thought, jaw locked and forcing himself to breathe. No. _No._ He will get her out. He will make her safe.

"You will never have my daughter. It ends with me. All of this will end with me."

**_Your delusions do you little justice, oh wise king._** Disdain in that unearthly voice, divine judgement that finds him wholly lacking. **_ As you say, the world is an ever-changing place. If Lady Ashelia B'nargin Dalmasca should one day seek our guidance, to put right what her father had not the courage to see through, we shall be certain to give her our… full attention._**

Less than a whisper, a shudder in the air, and he is alone again, with only the echo of his footsteps against the stones for solace.

* * *

"My king."

He does not feel so much calm as numb, which is good enough and will appear as bravery, for as long as this will take. Raminas goes with an honor guard, to sign the official surrender at the fortress at Nalbina, where his son-in-law died, along with countless brave Nabradians, Dalmascans, and any hope for their sovereignty. Still, there are many among his advisers who are willing to rally, though Rozarria commits to nothing. Of course, it is only in their favor to wait, to attack Archades after it has depleted its stores by reducing Rabanastre to rubble.

Let another land live on in legend, as the symbol of proud defiance. Let proud Bhujerba fly targets from its flagpoles, and demand death before dishonor. Raminas cannot do it. He will not.

"Highness, I beg you to reconsider."

Vossler is wise and battle-tested, a loyal knight to Dalmasca and its king. It is what makes him nervous here in the darkness, sitting astride a chocobo with Ashelia fast asleep, bundled tightly in his arms. The desert night has grown cold, the beast's breath steaming in the air. Vossler knows what Raminas has said he will do, but he has a soldier's instincts, and what he sees of the field makes him rightly uneasy.

"Sire, Nalbina is unfriendly ground and the Empire has all advantage. If you must sign such a treaty, at least let that be on our terms. I know it is not my place, but I must advise against this. If you would but let me come with you-"

"You have a far greater duty this night, than watching me sign our country away."

Ashelia keeps to her rooms these days, barely eats - his gentle daughter has grown cold and brittle, a flower frozen solid in a sudden frost. Vossler himself does not realize he is the only one who knows she is being spirited away, that she will sleep the whole of the long journey, and wake far from here, safe and protected with the knight's closest friends. Vossler has been told it is only until the treaty is signed, until Raminas has returned - yet a part of him must suspect there is more.

A small set of steps has been built near the wall, to help with reaching the saddle, and Raminas takes them up, so that he may look down now at his daughter's face, as he has done so often in the past. As a girl, she had fallen suddenly, dangerously ill, and he remembers long hours at her bedside, watching her toss and turn, helpless to act. As pale and drawn now as she was then, so weary even in sleep. Raminas would have spared her any suffering, would have done anything to take her pain as his own and yet again, he has failed utterly to do so. He dares not even send a note with her, some letter to explain on awakening - the less she knows, the better. It has broken her, this war, and he knows not what she will do with her life from this point on, only that it will be as far from the Empire and their machinations as he can make it so.

Tomorrow morning, they will announce her suicide. A fire spell, a death of protest and great outrage and, most importantly, one that leaves no body behind.

"My liege-"

"Enough, Vossler. Enough. All will be well, if you will fulfill your duties to your king and country, and to my daughter. My faith is with you."

The knight swallows, fighting against his own fealty. "Is there anything… that you wish me to tell Her Highness?"

Raminas does not want to leave her. He wished for none of this. It is killing him, his soul torn in two, to do what he must. He wants to be more certain than he is. He does not want to be the one to choose this path. He is afraid.

"Tell her it is no betrayal, to her husband or her father, to smile. To live. Tell her that I love her, and that no matter the distance, I will always be with her. That I will see her soon - it is not so far to Nalbina."

The knight shuts his eyes, almost a wince. He knows.

"My faith is with you, Vossler. All will be well."

"My king."

A nod of his head, the closest he can manage to a salute with the precious burden in his arms, and then Vossler is away, disappearing into the night and taking Raminas' heart with him.

There is very little left to do.

* * *

Raminas has done his best, to endanger as few as possible in his final act as Dalmasca's king. He takes but a skeleton crew, those among his knights who would never allow him to leave them behind.

It is somewhat painful then, to arrive at the Fortress and find more than the Imperial guard sent to meet them. It is not quite an army, the collection of Nabradians and Dalmascans assembled near the fortress, a loose sort of border guard, and most importantly, all looking for a fight. Ostensibly here in support and defense of his kingdom, but the eyes that gaze upon Raminas are full of judgment, disappointment, perhaps even hatred. Already aware of what he is here to do, and so he does not bother trying to speak to them, certain it can only do as much harm as good.

Raminas lifts a hand at the entrance, stepping away from the last of his allies.

"I shall continue on in the company of our hosts. Wait for me in the airship."

Basch, loyal to the end, moves to follow. "Highness, I would recommend-"

"That is an order, captain."

The closest Raminas has come to sounding like a king in months, he thinks. The man salutes, everything else he wants to say kept quietly behind his eyes. The Archadians keep themselves secreted behind full suits of armor, faceless and distant. If he was not past the time for plans and hopes and fears, it would be rather intimidating. All of that, though, is over and done with, and he can instead look about him in quiet contemplation, Nalbina still carrying the smell of battle even with bodies gone and the blood washed away. The damage is extensive, walls half-crumbled and wreckage strewn to mark the epicenter of the cannon fire, scorch marks of spells cast all across the stones. Raminas wonders where Rassler fell, finds himself looking, as if there would be any way to discover it.

He is led for too long a distance to a well-secluded room, and the soldier bows, and the door is shut behind him. At least they have abandoned all pretense here, no need to keep up appearances. The hall is long and dark and mostly empty. A chair, a table, and the treaty.

Raminas sits down, slowly, heavily. The easiest part of all of this, to sign away his kingdom with a single stroke of the pen, his seal in the wax. So silent here, far enough inside the fortress that anything might be happening outside. He can guess, and hopes there will be as little bloodshed as possible, though it seems unlikely to be so.

He does not even hear the man enter, from some hidden door behind him. Simply there, a few feet away, as if he had always been.

"So, this is Archadia's executioner." He looks quite young in the dim light, holds himself tall and proud. Raminas knows him, though this is the first time he has seen one of his enemy face-to-face. Vayne Solidor, the emperor's eldest child and heir. "I suppose it is an honor. I did not expect you would tend to such a matter yourself."

Nothing arrogant, no coiled violence or smirking malice in his expression. Raminas has heard tales of House Solidor, of ruthlessness, of cruelty and horror and vice. It is said that the man before him murdered his two brothers, to put himself in line for the throne. It does not seem a match to his mood - so quiet, with a thoughtful, distant gaze.

"I find it easier to sleep at night, when I do not delegate my sins to other men." Vayne reaches for the treaty, glancing up at him and then back down at the paper in his hand. Surprised, perhaps, though Raminas cannot imagine what use there would be in fighting now. "You have signed it."

"It is why we are here, is it not?"

"So they say." Vayne tucks it into an inner pocket of his coat. "Where is the Lady Ashelia?"

The lights at the far side of the room blur, and waver slightly. A shame, there is no window here. Raminas had looked long into the night sky, one last glimpse before stepping into the fortress, though it had been too brightly lit for stars.

"Dead. My daughter was slain by her own hand, as I made to journey here."

"Doubtful."

Raminas glares back.

"It is not enough, the despair of a husband killed in battle, and her kingdom fallen? The shame of a father too old and too cowardly to fight?"

A slight smile, then. It is very nearly gentle. "If there is shame in choosing concession over suicide, the gods judge us all too harshly." He has old, old eyes, this Imperial prince. He has not come to gloat. This is barely a victory. "Tell me where the Sun-Cryst is, your highness, and I swear on my life that you and your daughter will not be harmed. You may return home, to tend to your people much as you did before. You know as well as I do, the Empire has little interest in ruling Dalmasca."

Yes, of course. What else is there? Raminas is not himself, not even his title - he is simply the mouthpiece for greater secrets. The greatest secret in all Ivalice.

"… and what would you do, were you to find it? Present it to your father? Keep it for your own? What is it that you so desire, that you do not already posses?"

"I will destroy it."

"Now it is my turn to doubt." And he knows, Raminas knows that they all - Rozarria, Bhujerba and Archadia alike - believe he keeps it from them purely out of fear or spite. They have no idea how much larger this is, than one war, than one country, or any moment in time - not even this great conflict, with Dalmasca itself in the balance. A weapon forged is as good as a weapon used, and it must never, _never_ be used, and they do not understand and he cannot make them understand. Raminas swallows hard, feels the chill rising in his throat. He is out of time. "You cannot imagine what you ask of me. What it is that you seek."

"Why did you not wield its power? You could have prevented this."

Raminas smiles sadly, shakes his head. Of all those he owes answers to, Archades is the least of these.

It is almost regret, in Solidor's eyes. Do the sons of Emperors feel such things? "If you do not relinquish the stone, you will not leave this room alive."

Raminas leans forward, and sets the small, empty phial on the corner of the table.

"No. I will not."

Some small satisfaction, in seeing the moment of surprise on Vayne's face - yes, he has failed in all else, but he is yet brave enough for this. A slow-acting but capable poison, beyond the aid of any spell or remedy, taken before he'd ever come to this room. Raminas will not have his country held hostage, for what he cannot surrender. This is the final price, his vow as Raithwall's heir, as the world begins to dim, as each breath comes with greater effort.

"Be gentle to my people, Imperial, if there is any grace in you. See Rabinastre with… with your own eyes, and judge her kindly. I pray you.. be merciful."

Vayne has crossed the distance between them, down on one knee, hands on the arms of his chair. His voice is urgent - he knows he is already too late.

"Where is the Sun-Cryst? _Where_?"

Raminas shakes his head, surprised at himself, wonders if it is nobility or foolishness. Here at the end of things, and he cannot pass on that sin, not even to this, his well-deserving enemy. "Do not pursue it. It is no power, only folly and… heartbreak past enduring. Let it die, son of Archades. Leave it sleeping. Let it fade."

Ashelia, daughter, be brave. Ancestors, great kings, forgive him. He tried.

He tried.

* * *

Ideally, Vayne would have ended this with the Sun-Cryst in his possession, and a living king and any number of possible options, his father and his father's plans be damned. If not that, then at least the king in hand, to lean on the daughter and force her to give up the stone - she is not dead, without the body in front of him Vayne will never believe it - and yet he had prepared this contingency, hadn't he? Planned it all the way through, for just such an outcome, neither stone nor king nor heir in his grasp, only a feigned conspiracy that will absolve the Empire of any blame, and a way to rein in both Ondore and the late princess, should she decide to resurrect herself.

Foolish, to think Raminas could imagine he wanted the Sun-Cryst for any other reason than its power, when Vayne himself does not know if he can destroy it. Who is to say? If it secured peace for Raithwall's long reign, it seems insanity to relinquish it, even if it means challenging the Occuria and their hold - and yet the man before him was Raithwall's own heir, their chosen vessel - and he preferred to be corpse than Dynast-King.

By the gods, _why_? It is not a question Vayne is comfortable leaving unanswered, yet at the moment, there is no further use in asking.

He sighs, and reaches out. Gently passes a hand over the old man's eyes, closing them for the final time. The sum of such a life, to end it here alone, among his enemies, having signed away both home and sovereignty. What hope is there for anyone, when this is what the world bequeaths its kings?

"I have taken much from you, and now I must go one step further." Vayne says softly, loosing the dagger from its sheath. "Forgive me this final desecration."

He plunges the knife into the body, the necessary evidence, just as the door behind him swings open, clanging hard off the wall. It is a furious fight that spills into the room, by now the forces of Dalmasca that had gathered in front of the fortress well-roused by rumors of treachery, contradictory rumors that Raminas has signed the treaty, that he has refused, that agents for rebellion seek to kill him, that the Archadians surely will - and this confusion is clear on the face of the Dalmascan soldier that turns to see the fallen king, just before a familiar blade cuts him down from behind.

Gabranth fights like a demon, always. His swords cannot fly fast enough, he cannot bring them down with enough force no matter who the enemy may be. He is a man searching - like so many - for a home, for a reason to keep fighting, a cause to serve. Vayne knows of the fall of Landis, the invalid mother, the brother who abandoned them. Gabranth yearns for a patriot's fanaticism, that he can give himself over to it, that it might yet replace what has been lost, the family that anchored him, the truths that crumbled even as he clung to them. Serving the Empire isn't enough, though he is trying, loyal to House Solidor only because of what he would have to face in himself, to break that trust now. Quite clearly, he does not wish for war or conquest, it is not what drives him. He wants to defend, to protect. He needs to be needed.

Impossible to find a better guardian for his brother, then, even if Vayne could cast one straight from the forge. Gabranth believes he is ruthless, perhaps at some level even thinks he is a traitor, for joining with the Empire. Somehow not as pure as his brother, and thus left behind on purpose, unfit for those greater ideals even as he despises them. It is easy to take pride in surviving, and yet loathe it at the same time. Hate is a complicated machine, Vayne knows that full well - just as he knows that Larsa is sublimely uncomplicated, that Gabranth could do naught else but protect him. It is doubtful the Judge lasted a full five minutes against his brother's charms, that perfect combination of nobility and kindness and all the vulnerability it entails.

Vayne needs him as Judge Magister, as autonomous as possible and secure at his brother's side. Drace will hesitate, should the Senate move, her nature to seek the moderate path, balking at bloodshed. Gabranth will have no such qualms, Vayne is sure of it. He is guaranteed the position now, payment for services rendered, as long as he does not fail in this rather delicate task.

The last of the soldiers falls, easily dispatched. Gabranth pulls his helm off, lets it drop to the ground, and looks past Vayne for a moment, to where the king's body is slumped in the chair. No doubt the Judge believes he did the deed, and it may as well be true. Enough blood on his hands, one king more is neither here nor there.

"Basch is here. On his way right to us. The fool."

The last words spat out. Gabranth is angrier than he looks, stripping out of his armor, the uniform of the Dalmascan guard underneath. An absurd contingency plan, the stuff of poor, second-rate theatre. It never should have come to this.

"Any second thoughts?"

Hard eyes meet his own. It is amusing, both that Gabranth thinks he is hiding his distaste for Vayne, or that he believes it matters. "I am no traitor."

Ah, unintentional irony. What other reason to bother getting up in the morning? A shame it seems to go right over Gabranth's head. He is lost in the past, perhaps looking forward to this reunion, perhaps dreading it. Hate is complicated, especially when it involves family.

"I shall await my cue then, Basch fon Rosenberg."

As much time as he spends in the shadows, Vayne is not much comfortable there. It gets tedious, and complicated, and he stands ever in danger of losing sight of the goal, or why it even matters. He has seen so much, so many lives that seem to thrive or crumble on fortune's whims. Great plans, pondered at length by the most prudent of men, that fail within moments of their execution. The rise and fall of Senators, desperate acts by noble souls, good men turned to the blackest of sinners in pursuit of what seem to be, in the end, no more than the most fragile and transient of illusions.

So many will die tonight, so much time and effort and deception over a piece of land Archades may not even deign to keep.

The old king's body, slumped in the chair as Vayne passes by, abandoned by a spirit that might linger still, troubled by choices made in life and fearful for the future of his people. He is right to be, this is not over, and even Vayne cannot be certain of the final outcome.

Perhaps this is it, though. All there is after all the struggles of a lifetime, the simple inevitably of ending as a body on the floor or - if he is truly cunning and cutthroat to the last - to be the one to die in the chair.

A shout, a struggle just past the door, Gabranth's trap snapping shut on a wholly unsuspecting brother. He does not listen too closely, the few words between them are surely personal business, before what is either the sound of Gabranth's fist or his knee driven hard in his brother's gut, a second blow sending him to the floor.

Vayne reaches out, takes the small vial from the corner of the table, slips it into a pocket. Of little consequence now, but it is impossible to be overcautious. He pauses again, looks at Raminas' body in profile, listening to Gabranth's captured brother struggle, breath hissing against the stones.

In spite of all he knows, or perhaps because of it, Vayne would like very much to believe in a better fate. Not forever and always a world of futile grasping, of restless, hopeless ghosts. Beyond this world, that there might be a place where no soul is left uneasy.

At the end of all things, that the spirits of men may gather, and laugh together, at how much it all seemed to matter at the time.

* * *

Author's Notes:

1. I actually have a few stories that come chronologically before this one, but it got all talky and demanded to get written up first. So, here you go.


	9. and times being what they are

"Sir? Doctor Cid, sir?"

He does not and has never had anything resembling Vayne's ability to wake in an instant, snapping so swiftly to alertness it's rather impossible to be sure he was actually taking a moment's rest. In his younger days, at least, Cid had been able to negotiate for better terms with sleep until at least sunrise, the lab's coffee machine practically a holy relic. Oh to be young again, and strung out on an endless supply of questionable chemicals in rampant pursuit of an escaping thesis.

"Sir? I'm sorry to disturb you. It's very important."

Important enough for the aide to actually be _in_ his room and not just knocking at the door, and even with his eyelids gummed shut the overhead lights snap on in a merciless blaze, white space burning where his thoughts have been chased away. Cid groans, throwing an arm over his eyes. Fully clothed, which means falling into bed, which means he should have heard the explosion, whatever's happened. The alarms ought to be going off, Draklor has excellent failsafes for the inevitable disasters. He rubs at his face, hauling himself upright, into a moment of sickening vertigo, still barely half awake and trying to remember how dangerous the last thing he was working on was.

"Is the project secure? Who's in the lab? What's the… status…" It wasn't dangerous, was it? A recalibration of one of the engines off the Ifrit, he finally remembers. Nothing the team doesn't know how to do without him, no problems so far - but then this is Nethicite, which seems remarkably clever at finding new ways to trick his interns into blowing themselves up. No one's died - yet - but as the research moves into new and different areas, it's become as easy to predict the outcome as it is playing pass the parcel with a cactoid taped to a well-provoked bomb. Less a matter of if than when.

Gods above, he's tired. What time is it, anyway?

He rubs a hand against his face, as his eyes finally adjust to the light. The man is not, in fact, one of his aides.

"Who the hell-"

"Sir, it concerns Nabudis."

And then Cid is more awake than he's ever been in his life.

* * *

He is the head scientist in the largest and most well-funded lab in what is arguably the most powerful nation on the planet. For over half of his life, he has devoted himself to the largest projects, the most revolutionary ideas, the most innovative technologies, using increasingly dangerous methods and materials to test the limits of human understanding. The underlying tone of every order from his Emperor is, of course, nothing less than to remake the world. Colleagues, co-workers and enemies alike believe he is more than a little out of his mind.

None of this suggests any mistakes Cid makes will ever be considered 'small.' Even by those standards, Nabudis is failure on a standard more familiar to myth than actual human experience. How truly Imperial, really, to be well on their way to mowing over Nabradia, only to go and and blow half of it up before they can get there.

Venat had located the Midlight Shard in Nabudis, the only one of the Dynast-King's relics they might reasonably acquire, and the only way of testing the treaty blade he'd been able to create - only two dozen failures, before he'd come up with something Venat had thought might work. A blade that could destroy the Sun-Cryst, and the Midlight Shard seemed a perfect test. Save for the fact it was in the middle of the Nabradian capital city, and though there had yet been no true declaration of war, at this point it was little more than a formality.

Vayne Solidor is a brilliant strategist, a charismatic leader and very good at subterfuge - his enemies would not hate him nearly as much, were it at all otherwise. If he has any glaring flaw, it is one Cid shares - a deep distaste for working from too great a distance, trusting vital tasks to any hands but his own. Still, there was nothing to be done for it. The Midlight Shard was in Nabudis, and retrieving it with any real force before the taking of the city was nigh impossible.

It does not help, that Cid's research has proven incredibly successful, enough that the even rumors of the Dynast-King's hidden trove, the weapons that Raithwall used to secure peace in his time - the Sun-Cryst itself - these are not the empty tales they once were, and the Emperor is hardly the only one watching Cid's work with a covetous interest. Imagine, what an enterprising Judge might be able to secure with such power, with even a single Shard, let alone the promise of more.

So in the end, it is a simple plan with simple instructions, for a single Judge as yet uncommitted to a cause or faction, with no deep loyalties or - with a bit of careful tale-telling - a true idea of the value of his task. He is to wait in Nabudis, carrying Cid's treaty blade in with him, uncover the Midlight Shard and then keep it in safety, waiting out the end of hostilities. Amusing, perhaps, that a war zone will be a better place for state secrets than the Imperial Palace, yet there it is.

The Judge leaves in secrecy, with half a dozen places marked to track down his quarry, and there will be no word from him, in success or failure, until the war is over. God or not, Venat remembers a different world than the one they now inhabit, and its suggestions are only possibilities, only clues. Buildings crumble, secrets shift beneath old stones, and yet it seems a good enough plan.

Difficult now, to imagine what the bad plan could have possibly looked like.

Cid had to admit, he'd been curious from the very start. Just how did Nethicite differ, cut from the heart of the Sun-Cryst itself rather than coming out of a lab? Apparently the difference was that his version tore the occasional thumb off of a careless researcher, while Deifacted Nethicite killed thousands. Tens of thousands, tearing the very heart out of the city and… well, he'd heard the stories, many stories, but the one that summed it all up was how the survivors had run _toward_ the invading army, far preferring the Archadians to what lay in the ruins of their former capital.

Who knew exactly what had happened? Had there been a double deal? Had their agent realized the value of what he held, and tried to take its power for himself? Had Nabradia learned of the Judge in their midst? Or perhaps Rozarria had been there with men of their own, eager for the chance to study a piece of Deifacted Nethicite for themselves. All the old stories, all the old myths and their power returning to life and truth, all because Doctor Cidolfus Demen Bunasa started hearing voices and actually listened to them.

Far too optimistic, to imagine the newly-christened Necrohol might change Rozarria's mind about Nethicite. If anything, it had been the final catalyst, cementing all positions to full-on alert, driving what remained of Nabradia ahead into the only course left for them, with Dalmasca rousing to avenge the horror visited on her sister-state.

It is not his fault. Or perhaps it is entirely his fault. Cid realizes he can't quite grasp it, the sheer numbers involved, and there is the tiniest cold comfort in the idea that at least they would not have known what was happening. It would have been over in moments, before there was even time to be afraid.

No one he can ask, to judge him or absolve him, because in Archadia's eyes it has nothing to do with them at all. Oh certainly, everyone guesses at the truth, the Emperor and the Judges and a very, very edgy Rozarria, but no one's about to speak up, except to wonder what the hell Nabradia did to itself. Some experiment with Nethicite on their own? Trying to find a weapon that might save them from the Empire? Who knows, perhaps that is exactly what happened.

Cid wonders, as he becomes intimately familiar with the ceiling of his room in the dark, and eventually as he gives up on sleep altogether, if maybe Venat isn't even close to the bottom, of how far down this will go, that perhaps insanity is a sliding scale that just keeps sliding. Eventually, the only thought left to turn over and over is that he's going to destroy the world. It's the only thing left to do, whether he wants to or not, and it doesn't matter what his intentions are or if he even tries. He's hasn't tried, all these times before, and look at what he has to show for it. It was something one of his professors had remarked upon, years ago now - more than smart enough to get into trouble but too damn daft to find his way out again.

He's a shipbuilder, with delusions of delusions of grandeur.

* * *

It is not until Rabanastre falls, not until Raminas is dead that there is any real chance at recovering the Midlight Shard. Perhaps it has been destroyed, though much as he believes in his skills, Cid holds out only half hopes for the treaty blade as any sort of success. If it has worked, though, they might recover it as well, and the key to destroying the Sun-Cryst will be theirs. He had wondered, all this time, how Venat could be so calm about their reluctance to commit, to refuse to destroy it.

Standing at the edge, of what remains of Nabudis, Cid thinks he understands. The Mist clings to everything, thick enough that it is difficult to breathe, stinging his lungs, yet that is not what leaves him dizzy, staring at an endless plain of cracked stone, all set at a slant. It tilted the _entire damn city_ - and Cid feels the world fall away in a moment of perfect clarity.

Destroy the world. If one small fragment could do all this, the Sun-Cryst itself…

"Cid." Vayne's voice is overloud and startling in this silent, dead space. No sounds, no birds, no animals, though they've encountered a few creatures already, warped and twisted monsters that speak to the sorts of horrors they will find inside. It's difficult to recover his composure, taking a deep, calming breath in this place out of the question, but after a moment he manages.

"I'm fine."

A premature conclusion, laughably so. The veil swirls away like smoke as they move forward, the Mist shifting, coalescing at the edge of the Necrohol itself, and then his wife is staring back at him. All the sadness of the world in her gaze, all the shame - she knows what he has done, and Cid staggers, sways - is steadied by Vayne's hand on his shoulder.

"Mist shadows. Echoes of what was, and who you carry with you - it is not her, Cid. She is not here."

Neither are Vayne's elder brothers, though they lean against the opposite wall in sullen disdain and solemn silence, exactly as Cid remembers them - and there are other figures, too. Enough to make him choke on his breath - hands reaching out as if pleading for help, the twist of a body attempting to flee, a mother throwing herself down, over the curled form of her child. The idea of ten-thousand lost, it is clearer now, standing in the middle of it. The corpse of a once-grand city, attended for eternity by the faded images of the damned.

"I did this."

"We did this. You and I, and my father, and Rozarria. The gods did this, if you wish to go that far." Vayne is angry, a rare hardness in his tone, and the world stops feeling as if it is about to slip away. "We are the only ones who can ensure this will not happen again. We cannot honor them now with pointless guilt, or save them with the blood of our people."

Imagine what such a weapon would do, unleashed in the center of Archades. Imagine how many would consider it naught but justice.

"So, then…" Cid breathes, and Venat is there beside him, as yet silent but waiting. The preparations for this were extensive, everything in secret and only the two of them, against the unknown, and even with Venat's assistance there is no guarantee what they will find.

"Starting to rethink your allegiances, Doctor?"

Vayne looks into the darkness, unflinching, the slightest hint of a smile on his face. How he is not already Emperor of all Ivalice is a mystery for the ages. Cid sighs, no more comfortable even after he take his gun in hand.

"Here I thought all I had to look forward to was your father cutting my head off."

A simple trip into the bowels of hell itself. What could possibly go wrong?

* * *

Cid wakes up to the feel of warm water trickling down his face, one arm screaming in pain where it is pinned underneath him. His body is twisted at an ugly angle, thrown to the ground by an angry hand. The air smells scorched, and his lungs burn - it hurts to cough, and when he runs his tongue against the roof of his mouth, he can taste the grit. He could count the parts of him that aren't aching on one hand, if his fingers would do him the courtesy of bending.

Slowly, he rolls over onto his back, and realizes that the water dripping from his temple is blood at the exact moment the thing that has been watching him from the ceiling screams, and drops down on top of him. Cid shouts, throwing himself backward, shoving at it blindly, and hears teeth or fangs clang off the gun he didn't know he was still holding. The magic comes out of sheer panic, only Lightning by blind luck, an overkill that catches it in midair, leaves it twitching and sizzling against the ground. It isn't until he's panting in the aftermath, listening to the patter of dirt from the crumbling walls, that Cid realizes how very close they are to being buried alive.

They.

"… Vayne?" It's a croak, less than a whisper, and Cid swallows twice and tries again, wishing he were twenty years younger, impossible to call out and still have the breath to stand. "Vayne? Where are you?"

Nausea hits him and the world rolls as he struggles to his feet, but Cid clenches his jaw and rides it out. Listening for anything else moving about in the shadows - the monsters as bad down here as anything he could have expected, and in incredible numbers - but for the moment all is silent, only his own harsh breathing echoing off stone walls.

"Vayne? Answer me!"

The recent past assaults him in a jumble of images, a tangle of fire and panic and pain. It's terrifyingly easy to get lost down here, an almost maze-like quality to this place, though this larger chamber - the walls are green, dull but still visible - so at least Cid knows where he is, remembers - he hasn't been moved, it is the same room where everything went wrong.

The Occuria. Finally, they'd shown themselves. After all this time, when Cid had wondered how that blow would finally fall.

"Venat?"

No answer, though even as he says it Cid knows better, remembers the whole of it. Making their way down here, following Venat's instruction and the map Cid had of the city, still somewhat useful though they'd had to take detours through shattered walls and around collapsed buildings. No bodies. The Midlight Shard had vaporized every living thing its power had consumed.

It made one wonder, about the Dynast-King, and his long reign of peace.

An arduous task, with new monsters at every turn, and even the small ones were clever enough to hunt in packs, but between swords and guns and magic, they'd managed to push forward, keep ahead of the worst of it. Until they'd reached this room, perhaps once the lower level of a house and an open courtyard, and the Magicite in his hand had flickered, flaring wildly, and Cid had followed its light to a crack in the wall, to a pile of debris and beneath it, glinting dully - his treaty blade. Split in half, but truly the weapon he had crafted. It seemed a strange impossibility, to find anything familiar here, as if he had held it in some age long past - no reason to think the Shard would be nearby, yet the blade alone might prove worth the effort of recovering it.

_**Cid.**_

He'd looked up, less at that shadowed whisper than to show Vayne the blade, the first piece of good news since they'd entered this god-forsaken nightmare - only to discover it had not been quite so forsaken.

**_I am sorry._**

Vayne stood in the center of the courtyard, the Midlight Shard in one hand, held high and studying it in what passed for light in the catacombs. He did not see what Cid could, did not know of the shadowed figures surrounding him. He did not hear them laugh, or what had to be Venat's scream, and even past that terrible, high-pitched howl, Cid could hear the voice, purring in triumph as the Midlight Shard flared to sudden life.

**_You wish so greatly for oblivion, Venat, then allow us to oblige you._**

He would forever wonder if it was his blade that had cracked the Shard, if that had caused the explosion that had leveled Nabudis, or if it - all of it - had all taken place by some other design, and it was the Occuria themselves who had put that traitorous flaw into its surface. Waiting for them. All of this a trap, so that Cid would blindly enter and bring the heir of House Solidor with him, that they might be rid of all their enemies in a single stroke.

He had no time, not to move or even shout a shout a warning, no time to do anything but watch as Vayne's eyes saw the fracture, and snapped to his, realizing what would happen in the instant that the Midlight Shard exploded, and burnt the whole of the world away.

"Vayne! Answer me!"

The voice that echoes off the walls sounds like a man unhinged, which is fine. Cid would much rather feel blind panic, would rather stumble like an idiot over cracked stones and feel it echo painfully through every muscle than deal with any of what is looming up beyond this moment. That he's only going to find a body - he'll be _lucky_ to find a body, and then it will be the simple question of whether to bring Vayne back to the surface, or to remain here and join him.

Who will tell Larsa that his brother is gone?

A soft sound, and Cid freezes, twisting, searching for whatever foul beast or abomination is waiting to strike, half-hoping it is something large and fast and he will have no chance to run or fight. Half-hoping it will _hurt_. A moment later, and he is diving forward, the sound not a growl but a soft, pained groan - a human sound.

"Vayne? Vayne, I'm here-" On his knees and digging, carefully pulling the debris away, pieces of the wall and the ceiling that is still groaning ominously above them, a crack now and then - shifting, this city-crypt unsettled by yet another stirring of long-forgotton magics, and if Vayne has broken a limb, or worse, then moving him - he has Curaga, though, and should be able to -

Cid pulls the last of the rubble away, and all his thoughts go still, and quiet.

Vayne's right side, shoulder to waist, is a mass of blood, shredded fabric mixed with skin and gleaming bits of what Cid thinks with a horrified sort of disconnect must be bone or even worse - realizing a moment later what they are, what they have to be to gleam so brightly. The Midlight Shard, exploded into a thousand pieces of shrapnel, tearing through the man now looking back at him with glassy eyes.

"Quite… remarkable." Vayne says around a hissing breath, his skin a sickly shade of gray, every tendon, every muscle pulled taut. Fighting with all he has against the onslaught of agony, Cid can see it in his gaze, in the white-knuckled fist of his uninjured hand.

"Hold on. Just hold on." He breathes, reaching out, staring stupidly as the Curaga flickers and dies at his fingertips.

Deifacted Nethicite. Of course it absorbs magic.

"Can you-" But Vayne has beaten him to it, trying a spell of his own, and the cry ripped from him, ground out through clenched teeth is almost more than Cid can bear.

"All right. Easy, easy…"

Meaningless words in a calm tone, with his own thoughts a blur, his hands moving entirely of their own accord. So many years fixing what is broken, a part of him comes to this naturally even as the rest of him is stunned raw with horror, and Cid is downing an Elixir and throwing up a barrier - twice, before it reaches past what Vayne is absorbing - and he has a handful of potions as if that's going to do _anything_, with monsters everywhere and the ceiling still threatening to cave in.

"Get it… out of me." Vayne hisses. "Burning… it's… Please. Get it _out_."

"I don't…" Except he does, and Vayne is right. If there's any chance… and it doesn't matter if it's the last thing he could ever want to do. Cid pulls his belt free, doubles it over, and Vayne bites down hard into the leather, eyes fixed on the ceiling. He's not a surgeon, but Cid's worked on delicate systems before, adjusting and repairing mechanisms half the size of a gil coin, and though all he has now is a dagger's point heated beneath a hurried Fire spell -

"It's going to be okay. Everything's going to be fine."

As if he's trying to comfort a child, and Cid doesn't know which of them the words are for, only that he has to say something, everything in him shaking save for his perfectly steady hands. He moves as quickly as he can, picking pieces of Nethicite out of skin and muscle, scraping away bits of blackened shirt, dousing careful measures of potion in its wake. If he doesn't think about what he's doing it's almost bearable, not asking why his work surface shudders now and again beneath the blade, the occasional hiss or whimper - and he's not getting it all. The larger pieces, the ones on the surface he can reach, but there's a fine layer, like dust, embedded deep in Vayne's skin, splinters lodged in that he doesn't dare try to pull out.

An interesting experiment, isn't it? The effects of Deifacted Nethicite violently introduced to a human body. Certainly that will produce some good data, at least on the short term. Cid wants nothing more to turn the blade around and cut out whatever part of him couldn't rest until this was done, until he'd gone and broken everything.

"You're bleeding."

"It's nothing." His head hurts, and his vision flickers whenever he glances back at the passageway behind him, attention drawn to skittering sounds in the darkness. "We're going to need to walk out of here."

"Oh, is that all?" Vayne swallows, hard, testing his barely-healed body as he slowly makes a fist, dried blood and potion leaving him looking more like one of the creatures that inhabits the Necrohol than anything trying to leave it, and there are so many shadows inside his skin, fragments of the Midlight Shard, useless now except to kill him slowly. Cid has a hand at his shoulder, as Vayne lifts himself up on his good arm, and it takes all his energy just to get that far.

"We can rest."

"No time. Whatever creatures were driven away by the explosion, they will not be delayed for long. I don't… You could-"

"I'll die before I leave you here." As if it was ever an option. He might be mistaking the slight relief in Vayne's eyes, the light is not so good.

"Well, then. Give me your gun. You're going to have to brace me by my bad arm-"

"_Vayne_."

"I can't move it near well enough to fire, and you have to be free to cast, or there's no way we'll ever reach the surface."

Between the headache and his ebbing adrenaline, Cid isn't sure he could reliably make an ice cube at the moment, but Vayne is right, there is no other option.

Getting into Nabudis was difficult, but the march out is endless, Cid half-dragging Vayne in a way that makes the taller man grimace and stiffen with what feels like every step, but his aim is true enough against the teeth and claws and gods know what else that comes at them from the darkness, and Cid tries to focus on keeping his spells focused and effective and not on his dwindling reserves of magic or Vayne's supply of ammunition.

"Venat?" Vayne finally asks, during one of their many pauses in what passes for a safe corner, the both of them breathing hard, Vayne leaning against the wall with fresh blood dripping off his fingers. Cid shakes his head.

"It was a trap, meant to end all of us here." He remembers that triumphant rumble, how easy it must have seemed for them, to silence this little insurrection. "For all I know of it, they used Venat's power to shatter the Shard."

No answer, and Cid looks up sharply, fearing the silence. Vayne has his eyes closed, leaning back against the wall, communing with whatever impossible reserve of strength he possesses, to keep going this far. He looks dead, and Cid yet again wonders at the state of his own sanity, if he hasn't let this place get in his head, reduce him to dragging a corpse around in circles and thinking there's something left to save.

"I can hear you fretting from here, old man." Vayne's voice, dry and amused and impossibly calm given circumstances pushed well past disaster, and he opens his eyes, turning him from lifeless body to just a man slowly dying, a regret Cid has yet to look forward to.

"I did this to you."

_Get_ angry_, damn it!_

The unspoken words sear the air between them. Cid wants to face anger, and outrage, and the promise of retribution the moment they reach safe, solid ground. Anything but that steady gaze, as if there's still nothing to forgive him for.

"_We_ did this. We stood against the gods - if that is even what they truly are - and here we remain. Still alive. Mostly."

In the darkness behind them - hopefully, behind them - something screeches, sending every hair up on Cid's body. He's been shivering for some unnoticed span of time, maybe shock, maybe just the dank, thick Mist-ridden air. Vayne isn't trembling at all, well past that point, his skin ice-cold, breathing shallowly as Cid gets the bad arm back over his shoulder, and they start walking again.

"I cannot condemn you, Cid. I have made too many mistakes, and surely will make more before the end. Besides," Vayne says, raising his weapon at the sound of rasping breath from the other end of the hall, turning into a low and deadly growl, "you make my life far too interesting."

Long before they reach the surface, Cid knows the truth, the reality that what he's been dreading all this time has finally come to pass. The weight of it, of Vayne leaning against him as they stagger, bloody and ruined, into what passes for sunshine in the ruins of Nabudis.

He doesn't need to destroy the whole world, after all. This will do.

This will do.


	10. and time is its only measure

It takes precious time he doesn't have, to find a viera willing to talk, let alone one that will guide him to the edge of Eryut. It helps considerably, when Cid tells her to name her price.

An airship and a small fortune later, and they are at the edge of a place that humes do not travel to. The viera doesn't linger, perhaps there is a single, backwards glance, before she leaves them without another word. Viera may be the best of all possible mercenaries, completely disinterested in nearly all the affairs of courts and kings, considering most double-dealing to be beneath them, and so he and Vayne are here with no one likely to be the wiser.

It is a long shot, the longest of long shots, and Cid does not know what he will do after this has failed, thinks it might involve an aggressive amount of alcohol and some incredibly bad short-term decisions. He has access to far more highly explosive materials than is healthy for a single person.

At least it doesn't take long for their arrival to draw attention. Two viera appear at the far end of the long path, one with a bow held loosely, and though they are different enough in appearance, the similarities in coloring create an eerie unity among them. Enough like a hume, save for the ears, yet no one would ever think their two races were at all the same. Cid wonders where the men are, or if he could even tell them apart if he saw them.

"This is not a place for humes. You must leave."

Cid can tell a good deal of attention is over his shoulder, to where Vayne stands, looking vaguely ill to any hume who might be looking, and likely far worse to their keen senses.

"We were told there was… is a wise woman of your people. Her name is Selias, and that we might find her among you."

"If there were, there is no reason she would see you. We do not meet with your kind."

He's been holding a large bundle all this time, unwraps it quietly. It is a recurve bow of particularly exquisite design, taken from one Archadian vault or another, ancient and fine, with delicate carvings along its length, the record of a battle fought before Cid's grandfather's grandfather was a boy.

"I would make a gift to you, for the courtesy. I was told that this was once a viera weapon, taken in a battle long ago. I imagine it is quite priceless."

The unarmed viera steps forward, takes it from his hand, running an appreciative hand across its surface, looking at him closely, questioning. As if Cid has any room left in his thoughts for ulterior motives. The other viera's expression does not change.

"You have returned what never was yours to take. We should help you for this?"

The little there is left of Cid's temper snaps. He can practically hear it go.

"I have another offer then, one you may find more convincing." He lifts the vial from his pocket, holds it up, faceted edges glinting in the light. "An odd chemical combination I came across one day. I haven't quite given it a name, yet. Quite interesting, though. You see, if you spill it on anything alive - humes, animals, plants - it burns, and it doesn't stop burning. Completely resistant to water, and most everything else. Marvelous stuff. I've been looking for a place to test it, somewhere… a bit spacious. Just to see what might happen."

At least he has their attention fully now, the one with the bow knocking an arrow to it, claws flexed and stance battle ready. No longer quite the pure and reserved creatures of the forest. Cid smiles - this at least, he knows how to deal with.

"Oh please, do you think I came here to deliver empty threats?" He glances casually skyward. "A decent-sized airship will carry, perhaps, sixteen-thousand gallons, when fitted properly. I doubt it would be enough to kill your Wood, not in one go. Especially since it's so difficult to aim. But I do think it might ruin your day, regardless. So I ask you again, gentle hosts of the forest, may we please speak with Selias?"

He has absolutely nothing to lose, and holds the fierce gaze without hesitation or even concern. After a moment the two viera exchange a meaningful glance, one of them walking quickly away while the other nods, ever so slightly. She would be exquisitely beautiful, if it wasn't obviously taking most of her concentration not to tear his throat out.

"You will follow me."

The viera puts a bit of distance between them right from the start, which is fine. Cid hovers at Vayne's elbow, not quite touching.

"What was it, really?" Vayne murmurs.

"Red potion in a green vial." Cid mutters back, dropping the useless bottle back in his pocket. The soft snort of amusement, weak as it is, is a very welcome sound.

"You're a better liar than I thought you'd be."

"I've had a long time to study."

* * *

They are led around the edge of what Cid assumes is the center of the village. It is breathtaking, a haven in the trees, nothing of its kind to be found elsewhere in Ivalice. The viera they see are all beautiful and serene and practically naked, obviously above all the petty grievances of the world, and Cid has never loathed anyone quite so profoundly in his entire life. Or perhaps he is simply jealous. A few of them obviously stare back with haughty disgust, but Cid is quite used to feeling like the shambling troll amidst the beautiful people. It's like an Archadian dinner party with more fur.

"Look. Look at that."

Vayne is pointing to a decorative, latticed curve, and Cid can see where the metal has been interspersed with the roots of trees, carefully grown in to replace the missing sections.

"It's manmade, isn't it? The floors. The metalwork. They didn't do all this."

Likely not. Cid cannot imagine these willowy creatures bothering to construct, say, the towering pillars at the edges of their platforms, and wishes he had the opportunity to see underneath, how it has all been put together. The ruins of yet another lost age of Ivalice, repurposed by the viera, though even in their original state it was clear these structures had been made to work with nature, intended to live with the trees. He is staring at the span of a bridge, a twin to the one they now stand on, and trying for a glance underneath it when he hears a short, choked sound behind him. Turns just in time for Vayne's hand to close around his upper arm, fingers clenching hard as he wavers on his feet.

"Damn it." Cid hisses, listening to Vayne draw a shaking breath. "You need to rest."

"It… I am fine. It passes, even now."

A few of the Viera are quietly watching with dark and curious eyes, and Cid tries very hard to keep from glaring back. It is not their fault, that they have been born here, pure and perfect, allowed to live in virtuous innocence forever as long as they do not stray. He has done more than enough to earn their censure, even if they do not know the particulars, nearly every detail of his existence a fine example of what is wrong with humes.

The viera leads them to a small room, and it is not long after that her companion returns, and at her side is the first viera Cid has seen who does not quite resemble the others. Still beautiful, still lithe and graceful - but she is old, Cid can tell, and if he can see it that means, for all he knows, it might be her bow they have brought back with them, or at least a very close relation. Her eyes are milky, opalescent, but she walks with sure and certain movements, and could probably still take his head off from across the room if she wanted to. She waits for the younger viera to leave before addressing them.

"I am Selias. You wished to see me. Why?"

Her tone is not encouraging, but Cid has no choice.

"We have journeyed here, to seek your aid. We were… informed by one of the viera who has journeyed beyond your borders, that you knew of secrets long forgotten. Healing arts, that no other is aware of."

Selias doesn't respond. With every moment that passes, it feels more and more like a Draklor budgetary inquiry.

"My name is Doctor Cidolfus Bunansa, and this is Vayne Solidor, heir to the Archadian Empire."

Still nothing, and Vayne doesn't bother trying to explain further, just takes off his coat and unbuttons the shirt beneath, fabric sliding away to reveal the mottled flesh of his right shoulder - blue and black, the colors of thin ice over dark water, shadowed tendrils threading out along his veins, a slow and tangled weed meant to strangle him in the end. It looks almost worse healed than it did when he was bleeding out in Nabudis, and Cid feels gutted all over again. The revulsion on Selias' face is clear, blind eyes no barrier to the weight of this sacrilege, and Cid can see her nostrils flare, lip curling in disgust as one hand finds purchase against the wall, claws digging in hard.

"You are a fool of a hume and it is right that you should die from this."

Vayne laughs. Cid has always known how little the man thinks of his own safety, not quite enough to be called reckless but always, always tempting fate, as if it is some secret game between himself and the world, daring it to do the worst. As if knowing it would all come to this in the end, and that laugh hurts to hear.

"How long do I have?"

Selias snorts derisively. "I know not how you have lasted this far. Get out, I will not have you die within the Wood."

Vayne is unmoved. Wounded and on unfamiliar ground, and yet he is as calm as if he is petitioning the Senate for what he knows they must give him.

"I have a brother. If our Empire is to be saved from itself, he must live to take the throne. He is young - yet too young to survive such dangers unprotected. I must live long enough to see him safely crowned."

"What do we care for the business of humes?" It obviously disgusts her to even have to say the word. "It matters naught to us if a thousand emperors die in your streets."

"It will be war. The men who will kill him, who will use the fall of my House to see their own glory, they will call for battle and rally the people and it will be war unending. The machines of the Archadian Empire will sweep across the land, and if you think you can remain in isolation simply because you do not _care_ for what they do, you will wake up one morning to find them at your very door. You will remember this moment, when there was still another way."

The viera laughs back, matching Vayne in such a way that Cid wonders how far back and on who's tree the family lines crossed. "I have lived a very long time, hume. You are hardly the first to be so arrogant, to consider your life the virtue on which the world spins. We are not so wholly unaware of the world outside the Wood as you think, and life there does not change as much as you are desperate to believe. You humes come, you make noise, declare yourselves to be whatever you believe suits you best, and you go and are forgotten. This is the way it has always been - in your histories as well as ours. In the end, you are all but words writ in the very air."

"What if you're wrong?"

"I suppose that you will die, and we will see."

Cid steps forward, about to be very loud and angry in a way that will help absolutely no one when the viera suddenly pauses, turning toward the door. Tilts her head, listening closely to what is obviously more for her than the wind rustling through the leaves. Sightless eyes narrow - strangely, Cid is sure he recognizes the expression on her face. Irritation and disbelief, when the results of an experiment aren't the ones he expected for no reason he can comprehend. When he's got a deadline and his reputation in the balance, and a perfectly valid natural law suddenly decides to become inconvenient.

"Stay here."

And with that, she is gone.

* * *

After a few moments, when it is clear that Selias has no intention of returning soon, it takes little to convince Vayne to take the low pallet near the window by the far wall. Cid allows a moment of purely childish pleasure, imagining her annoyance at having humes touching all of her things, but then Vayne is wincing just with the effort of sitting down, cradling his right arm carefully against his chest as Cid helps him to lie back. A stack of blankets rests in one corner of the room - he wonders if this is some sort of infirmary, imagines that fur would provide enough insulation most nights for the able-bodied, but he is thankful whatever the reason, the cloth soft and warm.

He does not know how Vayne has managed the last two weeks to hide the truth, allowing Cid alone to patch him up, subjecting himself without complaint to treatment after treatment that did nothing at all, until this truly last, desperate attempt. He has claimed everything from a poor meal to a slight cold, brushing off concern with the same easy disinterest - and if he is not worried, why should anyone else be? Cid is the only one still privy to the truth, to the way Vayne's eyes go dark and his breathing hitches as he finally relaxes, letting the facade that everything is as it should be fall away.

Cid sighs. "I think, on reflection, that Venat may have intended to kill us both."

Who was to say it had not allied with the rest of its kind, at the last? That this had not been some great game from the start? Bring Nethicite back into the world with some great tale of woe, then kill the only two who knew the whole story, and watch the world fall apart. His family is among the oldest names in Archades, Cid ought to know better than to trust any story at face value, even the ones that only he can hear.

"Well," Vayne murmurs, "at least it got us out of the city."

So much is between them, unspoken, and Cid does not know what to say or how to say it. The question of when and how Larsa must be told is not an argument he has felt strong enough to make yet, still hoping past hope that a miracle might occur. Still sure he will find it, if only he keeps looking.

He will never, ever be strong enough to admit otherwise.

"I… Vayne, I…"

"Had it all finished there, in Nabudis, it would not have been your fault. I have long made peace with the idea that my end would not likely be of my own choosing." Vayne looks up at the ceiling for a moment, and Cid has to glance away. Damn him for being so calm, for thinking this is all right, that it does not matter if he dies as long as he ties up all the loose ends on his way out. "We will simply have to come up with a new plan. You will need allies, if you are to stand against Ghis and Bergan - my father has turned to them far too often as of late, they would be blind not to see the opportunity in it. Drace…"

"Drace is a useless fool, easily swayed, and she sits in the pocket of the Senate." Cid is not feeling particularly generous at the moment, and the fact that the Judge can't say his name without sounding as if it's something she scraped from her boot heel doesn't help.

"Drace is noble, stubborn and principled, whatever she may think of me. She loves my brother dearly, she is loyal to him, and that is what matters. That is _all_ that matters. Gabranth as well - they fear him, as they should. I imagine he could take both of them, were the circumstances correctly aligned. I have never been quite certain of _why_, but he is loyal to my father, to House Solidor's right to rule. It would be a powerful alliance there, to keep my brother safe."

_… and what in hell am _I_ supposed to do?_ Cid wants to whine, like a selfish child, as if he is somehow the one condemned to a terrible fate. Yet it will be terrible, will it not? He no longer even has his madness for company.

"You might play my father off the Senate - that's always good fun on a dull day." Vayne's voice sounds hollow, perhaps the slightest bit slurred - this journey, the confrontation with the Viera, it has taken more out of him than he will admit to. "Don't let him… he is growing dangerous in his old age. Unpredictable, he has forgotten what his best interests are or how to reach them. It is not easy, to anticipate his next move, to know what fool's errand he will see as clever design. He will try… he wants to hurt me now, whatever the cost. He will poison Larsa against my memory."

"I will never let that happen." Cid reaches out, surprised at how hard Vayne's hand clutches against his own. It isn't just pain, his gaze turned away for a reason - and he is a damned fool for thinking Vayne so indifferent to his own death, whatever pretty words he might attempt to hide behind. "There is no way your brother would accept that. You know this."

"I have two people who'd like to argue with you, but I killed them." Vayne inhales, sharply, grip tightening so hard Cid can feel the bones in his hand shift. "I… don't let him do it. If there is any way… tell Larsa why I did what I did. Explain it in the whole. Tell him it wasn't a lie, that I loved him. That, at the least, was never a lie."

The Curaga does very little, drained away almost instantly - anything Cid _can_ do seems to do little, every possible remedy in every combination. At least it is quiet here, and the sun is warm through the open window, the shadows of leaves playing across the floor. A strange timelessness, sitting in silence, without any of his work, without papers or books but Cid doesn't mind, can't bring himself to concentrate anyway. It is enough to sit here, Vayne's hand in his own, grip loosening as he finally slips into an uneasy sleep, and Cid dare not move for fear of waking him again. He looks so pale, and utterly exhausted, and the hand clutching his is so terribly cold.

It truly cannot be much longer now.

One son in exile, content to loathe him forever, and this - his young prince, that all vows of loyalty and honor and the Bunansa name demand he lay down his life to protect, and look what has come of it. It should have been his price to pay. The Occuria should not have been so foolish - Vayne was the bystander, Cid is the one who stood at their door, with neither the brains nor the humility to back away. His arrogance, his foolish curiosity, and now the penalty, not even his to bear.

The bleak thoughts are more than enough to keep him occupied. So lost in thought and the certainty of what will happen next - that he has been through it before, the grave, the lab, and this time alone forever - that when a shadow falls across the floor, Cid looks up in startled confusion, having forgotten all about Selias or her outrage or her sudden departure. It is enough to rouse Vayne, and he and the viera regard each other for a long moment, in silence.

"The Wood has use of you, hume. I cannot imagine why, yet it is so."

A sigh of what is probably disgust, and Cid stands up as she moves forward, backing out of her way. Two more Viera enter the room, perhaps the ones that met them at the entrance, one with a bowl of hot water, steam rising from the surface, and another with a low table, which they place beside the pallet.

"What are you doing?" Cid asks, aware of the stupid note of panic in his voice, so far out of his element it's almost funny, and the hard look he is given says as much. The Viera exchange a few soft words with Selias and are gone again, and she is carefully unwrapping what at first appears to be a long bundle of twigs. It is only as he gets a better look that he sees it is some sort of stone, uneven at both ends and flaking small bits of sparkling dust, opaque and honeyed in the light. The viera sits lightly on the chair Cid had been using, and scrapes her claws across the surface, turning the water gold, before dragging a small cup through it.

"Drink."

"Wait. What are you-" But Vayne holds up a hand to quiet him, and it's true - they did come here for help with neither of them expecting to get half so far. Cid can see he is still cautious on the first sip, obviously trying to place the taste, yet quickly drains the rest of it at a gesture from the viera. Moments later he falls slack against the pillows, Selias taking the cup from his hand even as she pulls his shirt fully away.

"Damn it, wait-"

"He is in no danger, hume. Far better that he sleep through this."

Cid watches her pick at the stone - lined with channels, more like a piece of wood, and splintered fragments come apart under her hands, long, thin segments like needles of light. With the ease of long practice, she slides them into Vayne's shoulder, a trail down the whole side of his chest marking the worst of the damage. Cid sees them change, slowly fading from gold to blue and then black, the darkness drawn up into them, and the viera plucks them free, setting new needles in their place.

"It's not crystal is it?" Something different, about the way it catches the light. Cid frowns. "Resin?"

"It is a most precious gift, from the heart of the oldest tree in the Wood. I would not give such aid to humes, yet the Green Word bids it so." Her ear flicks - almost funny, she is greatly annoyed with him, with Vayne, with being forced to give them such assistance.

Cid glances out into the green-latticed sky.

"Can you tell it… her… that I am very grateful? More grateful than I can say."

The viera doesn't answer, not for a long time, and finally is pulling the last of the needles free, soaking and wringing out the cloth she'd wrapped the resin in, wiping what little blood there is away, laying it against Vayne's shoulder once more. He looks far improved already, no longer so pale, and though the places he was hit worst are still dark and ugly-looking, they are far more scattered, the marks less apparent, no blackened offshoots reaching out to choke off his life. When Cid reaches for his hand, it is warm to the touch.

"It is time only, not a cure, and I cannot say how much he has been given." The rest of the resin placed in his hand, when Cid had started to wonder just how much begging he might have to do. "It will not save him. Nothing can save him, but it may yet give him this time he believes he needs."

The relief hits him so hard it hurts. Thank the gods she already thinks so little of him, that he can fumble over the gratitude she does not want anyway.

"We will never… I swear to you, I will never forget this."

"Of course you will." It is not even said all that unkindly, something akin to pity in her unseeing gaze. "You humes, you destroy all that you touch, in search of some goal you cannot name, some place you cannot reach. All we can do is stay out of your way, and hope your time here will be as brief as you seem likely to make it."

How is Cid to argue, when he has thought much the same himself? He is old enough, yet she makes him feel like an idiot child, barely able to justify why he bothers breathing.

"I wish it was as easy, as you think it to be. If I could stop, just walk away, and make that the end of it… but it won't work. I've done too much already not to see this through. I may be damned, as you say, but if I do nothing it will end in disaster all the same." Cid looks down at Vayne Solidor, imperfect and flawed, with blood on his hands, and easily worth a dozen of those who risk nothing, who claim innocence through inaction and watch the world burn. "We are not all, I think, as utterly wretched as you would like to believe."

Selias says nothing, but rises. "You will rest here for the night, and leave in the morning, and never return."

Cid frowns, already wondering if they have overstayed their hospitality. "Perhaps it would be better…"

The viera shakes her head. "I do not argue with the Green Word, hume. You would do well do to do the same."

And then she is gone.

Cid soaks the cloth once more, taking a closer look at what has healed, to reassure himself it is not some fantasy, a desperate need to believe. Checks the steady beat of Vayne's pulse, far better than it was before their arrival. He looks down at what remains of Selias' gift, the gift of the Wood, wishing like hell he had a microscope on him right here and now. The Viera are right, humes do put an absurd amount of time and work into pure self-destruction, but they're also amazingly clever when it comes to saving themselves from their own stupidity. He can fix this. He is almost as good at fixing things as he is at breaking them.

Cid glances back at the chair, but it's just going to leave him with an ache in his neck to try and rest in it. Far easier to sit down on the floor and lean against the low bed, head pillowed on his arms and watching Vayne rest comfortably. The leaves rustle, and Cid glances up toward the open window. He wonders what this Wood of theirs knows of gratitude, of fealty and sacrifice and desperation born of love.

"Thank you."

He can't help but smile at his own foolishness. First talking to gods, and now he's speaking to the trees. It will be the chocobos next, no doubt.


	11. life in a box

"We're going to train you on the quarterstaff first. If mother catches me giving you anything with the hint of an edge, she'll have both our hides."

"More like a quarter-quarterstaff. It's bigger than she - ow!"

Her younger brother - two years younger than the oldest, and five older than her - yelps, jumping backward as Penelo catches him in the shin. It's been a whole lifetime of proving she can keep up with them, and she's not about to stop now. Behind her, probably sitting under the tree that used to shade the corner of their small courtyard, she hears Reks laugh, though it's hard to remember just when he and Vaan moved in for good. It wasn't rare to have them visit, though Vaan's parents are only a dim memory for her, cheerful voices talking with Penelo's parents in their front room, playing cards as she drifted off to sleep upstairs.

All the good memories blur together - her eldest brother in uniform, and then the both of them, tall and proud, with her mother sniffling, wiping at tears she refused to shed when it was time to wave goodbye. Learning to dance, lessons from the old, stern woman at the end of the road who would keep time with her cane, pounding a beat against the floor. Just as quick to rap a girl with it, if they dared not to pay attention, stronger and faster than she looked. It was rare that she would give praise - the dances were Dalmaca's heritage, they _ought_ to be learned perfectly - but it was also rare that Penelo went home rubbing at any bruises.

The day her father sat her down beside him, and went about explaining the books he was keeping, and what it meant. A line of neat pen strokes that could mark out the business of the whole world and everything in it, if she cared to learn how. All that hard work, providing for the house where Penelo had her own room and could get up each morning, unlatch the back window and watch the sun rise over the eastern edge of the city. The reason she'd been able to travel, even the little bit that she had, following him on a few of his trips, once even as far as Balfonheim, a journey that was the highlight of her young life.

She remembers reading the letters her brothers sent, describing life on the borders of Dalmasca, or Nalbina, when they'd visited the capital just before the royal wedding. It had been grand, the princess as lovely as anything Penelo had ever seen, and there had been a great feast in every house, and it seems the whole city had been happy that day.

The world seemed so big, then. Or perhaps that came later, in the looking back, before Penelo had known it could be any other way.

The quarterstaff had been early on, before her younger brother had left, and she'd started to take over his share of the work. Once she'd begun making regular trips to the desert, having a blade was useful for all kinds of things. Penelo quickly grew to know as much of the sands as she did of the city, rarely had to defend herself even though her brothers had taught her most of what they'd learned, and she'd paid attention, and practiced.

Her mother had sighed and fretted over her little girl, growing up as anything but, and her father had laughed. Always laughing, cheerful in his lessons. How important it was to know how to do as much as she could, to never ignore the chance to learn a new skill. It was necessary to succeed, and then to help one's neighbors do the same. Sharing good fortune was the whole point of having it in the first place, and they hadn't hesitated to welcome Vaan and Reks in, after their parents hadn't made it through the plague. They'd had plenty, her parents worked hard and business was good.

A few more years, with the right deals made, and her father might own half-share in an airship of his own. He'd need someone - sensible, hard-working, his favorite daughter, perhaps - to go out into the world on his behalf, and from there, hardly anywhere she could not go.

Penelo had missed her brothers, both stationed at different corners of the country, far from Rabanastre, and it was wonderful to have new ones. Vaan was always ready for any adventure, if he hadn't already gone and found one without her, and she - well yes, she'd had her first crush on Reks and her first heartbreak when he'd started courting a girl a few houses down from where they lived, but no one had ever found out and she hadn't been forced to die of embarrassment.

And then everything had gone wrong.

And then everything got worse.

So bad, so fast that for that first full year of the occupation, Penelo had jumped at every shadow, and been afraid to close her eyes each night, for what the world might look like when she opened them.

But now, when it's dark and late, when it's too quiet and she can't sleep, Penelo shuts her eyes and thinks back, and then she's fourteen again, and she doesn't know her life is perfect.

There, her future has no horizon.

* * *

"Keste, you're off the beat, and you move your hips like they belong to someone else! Yes, you _do_. Well, if you can't then just watch Penelo, she's never wrong!"

A bad place to be, in the middle of the argument, so Penelo pretends she's not paying attention and just keeps dancing. Easy enough to do, the steps aren't all that complicated, one of their routines that resembles an old Dalmascan standard, with a bit more in the hips and hands, just to attract attention. Keste's brother had to work late so there's no one to give them a proper drumbeat, just the silver chime of bells around their ankles, and Nia slips in beside her as Penelo pivots and turns, hands out, curling her fingers to her wrist as she turns and dips and rolls into the movement, feeling it burn slightly in the backs of her calves, rolling her weight on the balls of her feet.

Nia is two years older than Penelo - much taller, far more beautiful - but they move through the end of the dance in perfect tandem. Penelo grimaces, hears Keste's feet slide off-step against the sandy floor, and Nia's annoyed exhale. It's a matter of circumstance, not really friendship for any of them, but Penelo needs a place to go, to get away, to _dance_, and this is what she has. Another of her father's lessons, all part of being a merchant - to work with what she has rather than complain over what she'd like. Nia isn't a bad person, just no-nonsense and impatient, and Keste might be better if she wasn't so worried about making mistakes.

Penelo doesn't worry, not when she's dancing.

It's hot, not enough of a cross-breeze to stir up any dust on the windowsill, but the stone beneath her feet is still cool, and the street outside is quiet enough at the moment. Three gil from each of them, to practice above the brewer's store, the air musty and stale and even this only temporary, until his next shipment comes in to fill the space. The courtyard in the west quarter had been better, but that had been five gil, and they'd been chased away eventually by the order of Kiltian priests and their shrine next door. It makes Penelo laugh to think about it, a little proud to imagine that she - in all her skinny, flat-chested glory - had been enough to distract them from their piety. A little hypocritical for them to scold - she knows the stories, that the gods themselves did dance, though the priestesses who honored them with the same are little more than myths now, cast out and hunted down as seducers, impure and sacrilegious.

Penelo thinks it may have been worth it, even to risk such an end.

Keste has an older brother, two sisters and an aunt, and they live in a tiny house just outside Lowtown. Nia's aunt is a dressmaker, and she lives over the shop, a cramped attic that she hates that none of them have seen. Penelo had never known them as more than distant acquaintances, before the occupation, and sometimes she wonders how they changed, from before. If Keste was always so quiet, if Nia had been quite so angry, if the silences between them would have been as taut as they are now, always crackling like the aftermath of magicks poorly cast.

"Oh, that's so _pretty_. Where'd you get it?"

Nia has a hand up near her throat, and her expression says she wishes Keste hadn't noticed, but now Penelo's looking too, and she sighs, pulling the pendant away from where she'd tucked it in her shirt, letting it dangle a bit by the chain. A tiny metal cage, glimmering green and blue, and Penelo guesses what it is even before she gives it a twist, a half-dozen tiny butterflies spilling out, rising in the air. Small pieces of rough-carved, scrap skystone, blue and green veins glinting through the darker rock, floating at the end of tiny chains. It is very pretty. It's also not from Rabanastre, and certainly nothing any of them can afford.

"It was a gift."

The silence is awkward, and stretches out. Nia had a boyfriend - fiancé - before the war, and no one has to ask what happened or where he died, but then this is Rabanastre, with a new piece of gossip for every grain of sand, and no one ever asks much about Nia.

Unlikely that it can all be true, her pretty face and haughty attitude inspire the worst sorts of rumors, dalliances with more soldiers than can possibly be even in all of Rabanastre. Penelo's been given warnings, from the old women who don't understand that they're not even friends, that Nia doesn't care what anyone thinks, and Penelo doesn't need to be protected, whatever the truth might be.

It's a rule, anyway. You don't ever ask how other people get along, how they do what they have to do to keep living.

The city bell rings, announcing the hour, cutting through the tension in the room.

"I have to go, my aunt needs me for chores. I'll see you later." Keste says, and waves to Penelo at the door, and then it's just the two of them. She takes an extra moment to stretch out. It's not always the easiest thing, to snatch some time for herself, and she wants to savor every moment.

"Hey, Penelo?"

She flinches, just slightly, when Nia looks at her, and of course the other girl has caught her off-balance, pulling the bells off so she can get her boots back on. It hasn't come up in a while, at least a week or two, but there is a bigger reason they're here, more than just for fun. Nia knows a man who knows a woman on one of the commercial skyships, the long-distance flights, and they're always looking for new entertainment.

The chance to dance her way across Ivalice. A lot of people on those transport ships, from all over, and if Penelo can't find more work as a dancer, there's always the chance of joining up with a trader, or a shipping crew. She knows business, she'd be useful, and if nothing else it's at least a chance. Something different, something new.

"Yes?"

Penelo hasn't told Migelo yet. Or Vaan. It seems like the sort of secret that might curl up and blow away, if she speaks it out loud, if she tries to make it into a real plan. She's not certain if she can leave them anyway, even if she's going to ask Vaan to come along. Keste's brother can't go, and with a few lessons Vaan could work the drums well enough, though Nia isn't all that convinced, and frankly, neither is Penelo. It takes some doing, to convince him to be part of any plan that's not his own.

She can't just leave him behind, though. Penelo needs Vaan to stay close, if only to keep an eye on him - he's been worrying her more lately, taking too many reckless chances, and she doesn't want to have to go it alone. It's already been too much, and too hard.

"I was thinking, maybe…"

Bracing herself for the fight now, the accusation she's heard before, that she's not taking this seriously, when Penelo has as much reason to do this as anyone. It's almost _too_ serious to try to make it real, and watch it fail - and Penelo can almost hear her father scolding her - thinking that way just leaves her defeated before she's even begun.

It says a good deal about the sort of man he was, that his optimism didn't save him in the end, and yet it still makes her feel strong, just to think of it.

Penelo looks up, when it's clear the other girl isn't going to finish her thought.

"What is it?"

Nia isn't looking at her, but for the first time in what seems like all day, she isn't frowning either. Distracted, lost in thought - not all that strange, when it seems like the world never stops changing long enough for anyone to truly catch up.

"Nevermind. It's nothing."

* * *

"Hey there, Penny. Just look at you. All grown up, and so very lovely."

Rabanastre is sprawling, but easy to navigate. Safe enough for the cautious, and even as a child Penelo had enjoyed long, rambling walks, feeling mostly invisible amidst the crowds. It hasn't been like that for a long time, that she's been able to let her mind wander. All too aware of where each and every one of the Archadian soldiers are stationed, and where there have been rumors - back alleys, abandoned buildings, shortcuts that girls especially have to avoid. Migelo always reminds her to stay visible, to keep away from the soldiers whenever she can, and Vaan just scowls.

It helps that her father knew everyone, and so Penelo does too, although even that isn't always the comfort it ought to be, that where she goes and what she does is always under someone's eye, that they can mention where she was yesterday and the sweet pears she bought and how Migelo might want to know about a deal on finding more. Her whole life is everyone else's business, and that's when they can remember she's not just a way to get news to the bangaa.

"You look good when you sweat. Might want to earn some coin for it, for once."

Vaan is ready to stand up against the Empire at a moment's notice, first in line to badmouth every Archadian in Dalmasca - and happy to do it face-to-face - but Penelo is the one who has to deal with the fact that not all her fellow Rabanastrians are nice. Not all ready to extend a helping hand, or interested in standing strong and allied against the enemy.

It doesn't seem like it should be much of a problem to stay unnoticed, Penelo knows she's always been more sturdy than pretty, and nothing approaching beautiful. Still, there have been plenty of times she's been made an offer while bartering for food and fresh water, and not just the Archadians who've suggested they can take good care of her, if she'd only let them.

The other reason she preferred dancing in the courtyard. The warehouse bumps up against what isn't quite a brothel, preferring to peddle their wares as a tavern that's well known for their dancers. The exotic girls of Rabanastre, ready to show off all they've got for the conquering army and their coin.

"Can't give me a smile, Penny? If you want, I'll even pay to see it."

It makes her skin crawl, to hear the nickname from him. What her mother used to call her, rebraiding her hair and scolding her softly, after Penelo had tagged along after her brothers into their adventures. The boys all called her Pen, which sounded less girly. Easier to shout as well, when they wanted to warn her they were about to do something stupid, and needed her to play lookout or pitch in.

Penelo knows this boy, only a few years older than she is. The sort of shiftless layabout who'd always made her mother shake her head, not able to get himself to the battlefield or even secure a decent day's work - and now he's perched at the door of the tavern, and always seems to know when she's passing by. His clothes are nicer than hers and he eats better, and he knows that she knows it.

"You get tired of slaving away for that bangaa, I'll be here. Always happy to do you a favor."

Penelo's fingernails bite into her palms, her fists are clenched so tight, and it takes everything she has not to turn around and show him just how little she wants or needs his help.

* * *

"Penelo, is that dye ready for me yet? It's the blue. Migelo said he'd split the case."

The way most people greet her, flagging her down from across the street as she makes her way home and barking out requests, too busy to bother with more than business. Penelo can't remember the woman's name, or anything about a dye order, and it's unlikely Migelo would break the case down without good reason, a popular color and expensive enough to get full price for the whole.

"Sorry, I don't have any the books with me. I can ask Migelo about it tonight, and he'll let me know for tomorrow."

The woman makes a sour face, less at Penelo than the circumstance, and turns back to her loom. Just in time for the man from the stall next to her to gesture her over.

It always takes twice as long as it ought to, getting back to Migelo's shop, though she's learned to budget for it. Penelo knows what's coming, and he swiftly loads her up like a pack chocobo with what feels like three-quarters of his stall, though he smiles brightly and asks about the shop and tops it off with three oranges for her trouble.

The chatter in the marketplace has been cut with nervous tension for weeks now, the rumor that Archades is close to choosing a permanent Lord Consul to replace the interim government that's lasted far longer than anyone expected. As far as Penelo knows, it's all still just rumors, a combination of hope and dread and horror stories of Judge Magisters, men like the worst of the most frightening Judges but bigger and stronger and unimaginably cruel.

Archades sends Judge Magisters when it wants things to disappear forever.

No surprise, then, when she walks into Migelo's shop to find him with a trader in pensive conversation, though it's still only speculation, not even a list of possibilities.

"It won't be a Judge Magister, not unless they have one of them they really want to punish. You think someone like that wants to end up here? I've shipped into Archadia, even _there_ they scare the hell out of people. The bastards are only meant for special occasions, like with Nalbina." Bitterness in his words. Maybe for someone fallen in battle. Maybe for the treaty that lost them their country and yet still cost them their king. "No way one of them would come down here to spend their time weighing spices and chasing turtles." The grizzled trader gives her a smile, rubbing at the patch over his left eye. "Hello there, darling. I see he's got you fooled into doing all his work again."

"Oh, I would never." Migelo scolds him, and Penelo makes sure to give him a big smile, that she agrees. Nothing wrong with hard work, although she is glad to put the bag down and stretch, quickly peeling one of the oranges. She offers a wedge to the trader and Migelo first, secretly glad when they decline.

"So, is there any news at all?" Penelo asks, a part of her going tense and still as the trader laughs sharply and Migelo's ears dip and his back hunches, a gesture that means yes there is news, and no, she doesn't want to hear it.

"The benefit of being too good at his job." The trader says, when Migelo doesn't answer. "Poor bastard's been picked to organize the fete. Welcome our new Lord Consul, whoever the hell he might be."

"Watch your tongue." Migelo mutters, and the trader apologizes to Penelo with a tip of his glass before draining the rest of the contents.

"I should be on my way. The fools I have packing cargo for me, it's like to all be upside down and backwards. A pleasure as always, Migelo. Let me know in a few months, if you want in on the next round of drop-offs. If you're still alive, that is."

Penelo has never been much for dark humor, and the last few years have brought few reasons to improve that view. The man leaves, and Migelo begins to sort through what she's brought, still a droop in his shoulders as Penelo searches for anything to say that might cheer him up. It had been half on her mind to talk to him about the plan, about Nia and the ships, but there's no chance of that now. Penelo owes him so much, even if he'd never let her treat it like an obligation, and she won't put anything on more on him than she has to.

"Well, at least you know you can save on the spices."

Archadian food is remarkably flavorless, from what she's tasted, and she and Vaan have had a considerable amount of fun as servers at a few of Migelo's banquets, watching the ridiculous faces they make over the simplest Dalmascan dishes.

Migelo laughs, more a huff and a slight shake of his shoulders, but it's heartening nonetheless.

"We haven't been to the palace yet. Vaan will be excited."

More likely, Vaan will try to make off with the candlesticks, as a noble gesture toward Dalmascan rebellion. He can't understand why she worries, that it doesn't mean she doesn't love her country, that she doesn't want to fight back too. He can be exactly like her brothers were, sometimes, which meant the good and the stubborn and the downright irritating. Vaan doesn't want to recognize that it's so much more than his own life at stake, that he has responsibilities even if they're inconvenient, even if he never asked for them. All she needs is for Kytes or Filo to decide it's a good idea to steal from soldiers, ready to follow Vaan's lead anywhere, which will end the only place it can, with all of them…

Penelo doesn't let herself think about where it might end. Or that Vaan is the same age Reks was - the _last_ age Reks was.

"I could dance this time, otherwise."

It's rare that Migelo lets her join in with an actual troupe, too worried about what might happen, if some Archadian noble should take a fancy, though Penelo can't imagine it. Imperial women have their own sort of elegance; careful, complicated and very expensive - no curveless peasant girl with a few bells on is going to compete with that.

"You're not going _anywhere_ near the palace." Migelo says, his voice so sharp that Penelo nearly drops the rest of the orange, though his expression softens as he looks at her. "I want you to be safe. I made a promise, I swore to your parents… and if anything were to happen…" He shifts from one foot to the other, fretfully.

"You think something's going to happen?"

It's been months now, since the Resistance has last made their presence known in any real way. The rumors vary - they were destroyed by the Archadians in some secret raid, there was some internal conflict that left them in tatters, or they've gone to Rozarria, to try and rally support for the cause there. No one knows much about who exactly is left to lead them, though some say Princess Ashelia herself stands among their ranks, that she'd faked her death to dodge the treacherous Empire and even now stands ready to reclaim the throne.

It could be just another rumor, no truth in it, and Penelo can't help feeling glad that, whatever their plans and whoever is in charge, the Resistance keeps well to themselves. Vaan will often tell tales of their brave fight against Archades to the younger boys. If he could find them, he might very well join them.

Migelo sighs, and shakes his head. Unlikely he knows any more than she does, but that doesn't mean he won't do what he can to keep her safe.

"I know it's getting late, but I have a delivery that needs to go out to the Plains, and they'll be wanting it today if I can get it there."

"Where's Vaan?"

Penelo already knows the answer, and rolls her eyes when Migelo shrugs sheepishly. When his heart is in it, Vaan can't be dissuaded from a goal, but it's much easier to sell him on the virtue of risky adventures than the less exciting tasks that keep them all surviving for another day.

"I'll do it. It'll be good to get out for a while."

* * *

"You there! Trader girl!"

It isn't just the merchants who know who she works for, enough of the soldiers do too, Migelo in business with Archadia just the same as anyone else. He has a good name in town, trustworthy and careful to hew to Imperial laws, and if Penelo has noticed certain things here and there - supplies in the storeroom that never seem to get sold so much as disappear, or compartments in the ships she's helped load up that seem an odd size, and in an odd, tucked-away location - well, she does not dwell on them.

Whatever Vaan might think, there are quiet ways to rebel, to do what they can to support those who are fighting without putting themselves in unnecessary danger.

The soldier who's flagged her down is mail delivery, astride his chocobo with several rough-woven sacks tied behind the saddle. "You going near the west gate?"

Penelo nods, and he passes a bundle down to her. Trustworthy enough for a tedious task, and it's been a long time now, that they've even had much interest in checking what she carries. Going through the gates can still be a chore, no way to be certain they'll let her by without trouble, and even with Migelo's permits the rules are always changing, sometimes the soldiers bored enough to be spiteful. Penelo has an allowance from the bangaa, for the days when nothing will make a proper argument except coin. Usually she can do good without it, some combination of being polite or friendly or making up some excuse, some emergency - it's not easy to cry on demand, but she can come close - and there's always the option to just try another gate, and have the trip take twice as long.

It's been easier, as of late. The guards don't change out as often as they once did, stationed at the gate for a full six-month so far, without being moved. Comfortable enough to even remove their helms, if their captains aren't around, which means Penelo can recognize many of the day shifts, and know if she is walking into trouble. Still Archadians, neither safe nor trustworthy, but there are still some that are safer than others.

"Ah, what loveliness - a sweet breeze on a dry day."

"Good afternoon, Sir Valde."

It's not required to give them a title, but Penelo finds it amuses them, and there is benefit to be had in seeming small and polite and harmless. Miguleo has sent her this way often enough, that there is real affection in the guard's greeting. He is old enough to be her father - is a father, three times over, two daughters and a son who live with their mother in the north. A place as cold and clear as Rabanastre shimmers with heat haze. Valde speaks of it often, as if to ward against the Dalmascan sun - deep forests of pine, clear lakes nestled between high mountain passes. If there is anything to compare them, he has said, it is the way the drifting snows in winter could almost be the deserts, washed pale under the moonlight. Valde is a good enough storyteller that Penelo's lungs almost ache to imagine it, as if she's been breathing in the thin, frigid air.

A beautiful place, his homeland, but little work to be had, so he had left his family for a soldier's life and a soldier's pay. Penelo thinks he sees his daughters, when he looks at her, and that is why he is kind. She has never quite known what to think of that, or how to feel.

"Our desert flower, blooming brightly while the rest of us wilt away."

"Flower? More like a desert mouse."

Penelo doesn't know the second soldier's name, but even though his tone is bitter, so far he's proved no more dangerous than Valde is. Always with a book in hand when not on duty, and she has seen him look up from it only a handful of times. The rules for serving Archadia are far more complicated than anything Penelo understood of Dalmasca's own forces - she does not understand it completely, even with all she has seen and heard. He is seemingly of high rank, and well-schooled, but all that had not kept him from being sent here from Bhujerba, a post he'd far preferred. He is always grumpy, then, and Penelo cannot help but marvel at the idea of having her country taken by, in some small part, a man who would rather not be here at all. He seems to wish for nothing from her or Rabanastre but to put his back to all of them.

"Little bird, I think." A playful tug at her shoulder, the decorations there that stick out like wings. The first time the soldier had touched her, Penelo's heart jumped into her throat, but that had been months ago, before she'd seen Helewys with her helm off, and realized it truly was a woman underneath all that armor. Luckily, all Penelo's shock had only made her laugh. Female soldiers were still rare in Archadia, but it was not impossible, and - Helewys had winked at her - far better than a convent, or the marriage bed. "Off to the plains again, are you?"

"Migelo had a late delivery. I've brought the post with me."

Penelo sets the pack down carefully, undoing the netting, and hears Helewys curse under her breath, turns to find her staring at the delivery, specifically a long case tucked into the bottom, the lock carved into what seems to be a formal seal.

"Take it, Hele. You've been waiting long enough."

Valde tosses it to her, and she catches it one-handed, staring grimly, as if she's holding a desert viper. The older solider rifles quickly through, pulling out a parcel of his own. Opening it carefully, only to burst into sudden, loud laughter. It is enough even to make the sour soldier look up from his book, staring blankly as the man lifts a pair of beautiful, carefully stitched mittens out of the small box.

"My daughter's been practicing." He says, the laughter still heavy in his voice, glancing up wryly at the burning sun. At least Penelo's clothes breathe, her arms and legs bare, and even then the desert can be daunting - she has yet to see an Archadian not sweating puddles in their armor.

Helewys hasn't moved, still staring at the case she's holding. Penelo ought to go, knows it, but there are days Archadia seems composed only of ill omens - this could be yet another, and she cannot turn away.

"It's not to do with Dalmasca. Only me."

"What is it?" Penelo asks, before she can think the better of it.

"Acceptance letter from the Akademy. If she got in." The grumpy solider says, not looking up from his book. "It doesn't matter as much as you think it does."

"You would know." Helewys snaps back, and there's a glare between them that has Penelo ready to step away. The woman sighs, and undoes the clasp, pulls out the parchment within, also sealed - everything in Archades is so complicated, always hidden layers, always locks and secrets - and Penelo's watching again, too curious for her own good, and again Helewys has noticed.

"Once every few years, they allow soldiers like us the right to compete, for those places in the Akademy the higher Houses don't snatch up. That I might one day be a Judge. It's still nothing for certain, even if you pass the trials and have all your marks in order… but Judge Magister Drace was my witness, and she-

"_She_?" One thing, to imagine women beneath some of the faceless suits of armor, perhaps even as Judges, and far another to imagine one among those whispered of, as the worst of fates that Rabanastre might face. The image in Penelo's mind is impossible, a childish, nightmare creature, but try as she might, she cannot make it seem more real.

Helewys is still staring at her scroll, her voice soft and low. "It's nothing but a fair chance, when there are those who still think we 'girls' aren't even fit to try. I'm a soldier first, as is she - Drace is no more woman than the man she inherited the position from, and he was less father than forge."

Penelo nods, though the words paint a murky picture, and those she does understand - but the thought of her own father, ever forcing her into a fight? Demanding that she be a soldier? He had never done so, not even to her brothers, it had always been their choice. Perhaps Vaan is right, and Archadia is full of monsters.

"You going to open it, then, or just stare at it all day?" Valde calls, and it seems to make up her mind, one gloved hand slicing roughly through the wax seal, unrolling it before she can think the better of it. Penelo watches her eyes dart across the page, searching for what her destiny will be. Remembers how proud her brothers had been to get their colors, and she'd understood then, believed it true, the necessity of sacrificing for the country.

After all that has happened, Penelo cannot be sure of anything the way she was before.

Helewys pauses for a moment, the decision hanging in the air, and then she smiles, small and proud, and shuts her eyes, clutching the scroll to her heart. Valde whistles, and Penelo feels the world fall into a strange, odd focus around her, likely the last person that should be standing here in this moment. Barely even an idea of what it means to be a Judge, save that they are far more dangerous than the soldiers if they decide not to like her, and it's twice as important to stay out of their way.

Here she is, though, and the woman is an Archadian and a soldier and - leaving. Vaan likes to think that every solider carries a grudge against Rabanastre, that they are all intent on grinding the city to dust, picking it clean of each inch of beauty, anything that shines. Penelo wishes she could still believe it, that things could be that simple - yet here is a woman, not so many years older than she is, and Rabanastre is but a place, a moment, just as like to be forgotten.

"I am… happy for you."

A knowing smile, as if Helewys can tell all that Penelo is thinking, the good and the bad and everything that doesn't make sense. She has never been unkind. Penelo hopes that will not change.

"You don't have to be, but I thank you, little bird."

* * *

"Penny. Penelo, love, I know you're awake."

The airships watch Nabudis vanish from a hundred miles away. Any closer, and they can only join the casualties, caught up in the flash and the roar, engines shattered as they fall from the sky. Penelo can't imagine it, no one can imagine it even though it is all anyone can speak of. How it happened, who caused it - all those people gone, and there are not the candles in all the world to light their lost way home again.

Rabanastre secures its gates, and the priests hold vigils with their doors open wide as the crowds fill inside, spilling out onto the street, and everyone fears the worst without ever speaking the fear aloud. Waiting for it to happen again. It does not come, is not such an end for those at Nalbina, though that day still crashes down on them, and when it does there is nothing at all to be grateful for.

The body of her younger brother returns. The body of her older brother does not. Penelo cries herself sick, cannot bear to be in the room when they wash and wrap him for burial, and her mother sings as she covers up what seem like such small wounds, nothing that could take him away from them so easily. Keening an old, old lament that echoes throughout the house and leaves Penelo trembling, the sound of it all but pushing her out of the house.

She climbs to the roof, where her brothers used to sit, where friends would call to each other all across the city. It is bare now, and empty, as far as she can see. The only lights in the streets are the swaying lanterns of the priests, moving from house to house, laying to rest so many of the brave soldiers of Dalmasca. It seems there is not a single house they do not stop at.

Mourning flags fly from all the ramparts of the palace. The king of Nabradia - Princess Ashelia's new husband - is dead, Nalbina has fallen and the Empire is coming.

"Penelo, please. I need you to look at me. It's important."

Reks leans silently against the door frame, burnished in the light that filters up from downstairs, where her parents are speaking with each other, with the neighbors, with Migelo. More than talk but less than argument, everything urgent, their voices low and hard, cracked at the edges like rough stone walls. Penelo knows now, what it is to see her mother cry, and to see her father afraid, and everything around her feels intangible, shadows and fire and air. She isn't a child anymore, but she feels more like one than ever before.

He leaves. Reks leaves them for what's left of the Dalmascan militia, regrouping for an uncertain defense, even as Penelo sees others packing up, shutting up shops and homes and abandoning Rabanastre for distant relatives on foreign shores. The discussion happens quietly, when they think she is asleep, whether it might not be better to follow, but her father's business has gone bone dry and if they go there will be nothing, wherever they land. Leave with nothing and arrive with nothing and Reks is going away.

Penelo sits very still, legs tucked up against her chest and her arms tight around them, listening to Vaan fight with him in the other room, his voice too high and cracking with an anger that isn't really anger. Begging to go along, and Penelo is not one for being so still but it's all she can think to do now, as if she could keep the whole world together, or perhaps persuade time itself to pass them by, if she can only keep from moving.

She's going to lose her other brothers now. It will be the shrouds again, bathing sallow, bloodless flesh and the priests with their prayers and her weeping mother and that's if anything of them even returns. Penelo swallows back a sour burn in her throat, and tries to breathe shallowly, so that even her chest does not rise or fall.

Reks goes. Vaan stays, but for those first few nights he is awake late into the night and Penelo thinks the morning will find his bed empty, perhaps a note, perhaps not even that. Rumors blow through the streets like storm winds: the princess has gone mad with grief, that Rozarria is on the march, and will reach them before the Empire does. A secret weapon sleeps within the city, like the Shard that took Nabudis, and the king will use it against Archades - no, he will deliver it to Rozarria in exchange for protection. They are searching for it still, there is no such thing, only myth - and every day grinds along and Raminas makes no proclamation and Vaan waits in the streets for letters from the front.

Penelo dances, even now. The old woman is gone, following her family west, and even at the end she does not cry, does not smile, simply takes Penelo by the shoulders and kisses each cheek, nodding as if satisfied. Penelo thinks she understands, that the woman has given what she can. A history that has survived much, that she will carry through this, and on to the next age. It is grace and it is beauty, in the circle of her arms as Penelo bends and turns, toes out, twists and bends back, held against gravity until her whole body trembles. It is joy, and there is peace in it, and on the days it does not ease her mind at least Penelo is too tired after to worry or fret or do anything but sleep.

"Everything's going to be fine, Penny. I'm going to make sure of it."

The money grows so tight there's hardly any at all, not that a coin can buy its weight in bread most days and Penelo's tongue is practically pickled, cheap salted meat and whatever sauce has enough of a flavor to bury the rest of the taste. She did not think they were so wealthy before, but each day it seems there is some new luxury to leave behind. Penelo's mother is always quiet, always distant, further and further away each day though she rarely leaves the front room. Her father is rarely home, returning unexpectedly in the late nights with what he can, food or plans or promises.

He'll still give her a smile, exhausted but real, and Penelo will sit at his feet by the fire and let him stroke her hair and she'll think of anything to say, any moment of the day that she can make shine. Making sure her voice is warm and bright, but not enough that it might break. A spell as strong as any real magick, and sometimes it's even enough to call her mother back from wherever she has gone, and they sit and talk quietly and it's almost, almost right.

Penelo isn't in the room, for the last conversation, but standing in the light at the doorway, listening in, and if Vaan were awake she thinks she'd look like Reks did. She wonders what he thought and felt because it's too hard to feel for herself, listening to her father and Migelo speak and if she did not know better she would swear they are enemies.

"It's too dangerous." The bangaa says, "You have no idea what's out there, let alone if you can trust them. If this were to go wrong-"

"I didn't work my whole life to leave my childr- my child with _nothing_. Raminas signs this treaty and we'll need capital, fast, or the Archadians will come in and there'll be nothing left. You know how easily they can do it - we have to move, now, if we want to have any hope of riding this out."

"At least one of you should-"

"I'm going with him." Penelo's mother, with a cold, bitter voice she's never heard before. "He can't do it alone. It's far from ideal, but what of this has been?"

Penelo draws away as the conversation tips over from argument into planning and she is cold and growing colder, her teeth practically chattering even as she wraps herself in blankets and curls up tight. Much later, she feels the dip at the edge of the bed, her father sitting down, a gentle hand on her shoulder.

"Penny. Penelo, love, I know you're awake."

If she doesn't turn around, nothing can happen. If she just stays here forever, looking at the slightly dappled surface of the far wall, and doesn't move or breathe, nothing will change.

"I need to talk to you, Pen. It's important."

She can't look.

"Where are you going? What are you going to do?"

"The details… they don't matter . All you need to know is, it's going to put everything to rights. I swear it. We're going to be gone for a few days, your mother and I, just like any other trip, and that's all. I'll bring you back something nice. Maybe some new ribbons for your hair?"

Trying too hard, the cheer in his tone like a fraying rope, she can hear it.

"No. Don't go." She whispers, hot tears falling on her knuckles, hands in fists near her mouth and she doesn't want to cry, doesn't want to make it worse for him but the words come anyway. "Please don't go. I don't care, I don't care if we don't have anything. I just need you, I need you both. Everything else… I don't want it. I don't care. Just don't go."

"Oh Penny, it's all right. Don't cry. Don't cry." His voice is strong again, her father is strong again, confident and sure as he draws her up, letting her cry on his shoulder. It makes her feel safe, and Penelo hates herself for it even as she holds on. Knows that he is consoling her only because their minds are already made up.

Later, much later she will ask what happened, what her father had intended, what the plan was, but Migelo refuses to tell her anything. As if she won't be able to imagine it just because the details aren't clear, as if ten-thousand terrible fates don't fight for her attention, each time she closes her eyes.

"It's going to be all right, Pen. I promise. Just a few days, then and everything will be all right."

Migelo must have been given the other version of that speech. What to do, when it turned out that nothing was going to be all right.

* * *

Imperials think all Dalmascans are lazy, and those in the city think the desert dwellers are shiftless, and Penelo's done business with all of them, enough to know that everyone has their reasons for making their own schedules. No Archadian is going to get decent service from any Dalmascan who isn't trying to lick their boots, and the nomads can be far more effective traders if they keep up an air of mystery and general disinterest, forcing outsiders to trade at their pace.

"Our father should be here any moment. I don't know what's keeping him."

It still makes her want to set something on fire, barely sipping at some rather bitter tea as a boy about her age does the same. Awkwardly making small talk, the both of them held hostage by an older sister long convinced that Penelo would make a good addition to the family, or at least a profitable one.

It already took longer to reach the Plains than it ever should have, a bridge knocked out by some passing beast, forcing Penelo into a long, unexpected detour. Any other day, it would have been a welcome respite, the desert quiet and unchanging, with slow clouds casting drifting shadows and no one needing her attention or her time. Now, though, she swears she can actually watch the sun being drawn toward the horizon as the woman nudges her brother to ask Penelo how things are in the city. Nudges him again to ask how the bangaa's business is going, if she's heard any new gossip. If Archadia has made their choice for Lord Consul, the most frequent question even here, outside the city, where it seems unlikely to ever matter.

"Nothing new, I'm afraid…" Penelo sets down her cup, lifting the bag again. "I really just need someone to sign for this. I'm expected back before dark."

Overhead, an airship is on slow course for the aerodrome. Penelo squints briefly, one hand over her eyes, but it's too far away to even tell what port it hailed from.

The woman smiles. "I'll go see if I can find him. You two stay here."

As soon as she is out of sight, the boy springs up.

"Come on. He's this way."

The opposite direction from where his sister walked, little surprise there. Penelo follows behind, the boy not giving her a second glance, completely indifferent. If he's anything like Vaan, he's interested in little more than causing trouble, maybe racing his father's bird in secret at night for small wagers. If she figures at all into his thoughts, it's as a convenient pleasure, no different than a drink or a particularly satisfying meal. Life on the Plains is simple and quiet, their lives all but untouched by even the greatest of Empires, but Penelo is not much interested in being valued the same as a chocobo with a knack for pecking out treasure, of no further interest than her skills in trade.

It does not take long to find the man who was, of course, unaware of her arrival, and with nothing to carry she makes good time on the return trip, but Penelo can still see the lamps in the city flicking on as dusk approaches. She hurries as quickly as she can while keeping an eye out for anything that might be watching her from the deepening shadows. Nothing much to worry her - until she returns to the west gate and finds it firmly closed, with no guards in sight. A helpless glance to the sky, the thin yellow line of the sun nearly set - but she knows she should have had time, at least another hour, surely-

Penelo lets loose with a string of curses that could make a moogle's wings fall off, taking a few steps back to glare at the wall, not that it improves the situation or her mood. A howl behind her, in the night, but she's still more annoyed than worried. Nothing's likely to attack her here, not so close to the city. At the worst, Penelo knows she can simply kick the sand until dawn, cold and hungry, and then deal with the morning guard - not nearly as well known to her - and they might decide to detain her, whether out of suspicion or pure spite. Getting in now will be a heavy bribe to whomever might hear her call - if they decide to do anything but laugh.

The only other choice, then, is to find her own way over. It's more stupid than dangerous, the gates closed as a matter of protocol, Archadia doing it because they can, not because they care much anymore, anyone who is a danger to the city already inside of it. Worth the risk, especially once Migelo starts to worry. If Penelo doesn't get home tonight, he'll have her stuck in town, or worse, behind a desk for the rest of the month, and that makes up her mind for her.

It takes a little while to find a decent route, though the wall is not in the best of repair and it seems Archadia has other concerns at present. Penelo wedges her fingers into the cracks and crevices, careful to make sure her weight will hold. It certainly wins no marks for grace or style, but she's spent enough time hauling cargo to be strong, and keeps quiet enough, and after a few false starts and slight backtracks, she reaches the top. Nothing to see but a few unremarkable buildings, and a fair view of a dim-lit, silent street, no sign of any soldiers at all. As long as she keeps her distance from the Archadian post, everything should be fine.

Penelo smirks to herself, imagining for a moment that she is some spy, some member of the Resistance off to fight for justice. Unlikely that they would bother with such a slow and clumsy infiltration, her fingers scraped and aching - and gods help her if she'd tried to do it in armor. Further consideration flees as she hears voices, the clank of heavy plate, and Penelo presses low to the wall, moving carefully away from the night watch, further into town.

The perfect plan, no begging with soldiers, no money spent, and no one the wiser. She chooses an empty patch of ground, climbing down until it's easier just to drop, and even that is quiet, the loudest sound of all when she dusts off her hands. Penelo stands in a quiet little courtyard, a few trees and some low scrub, and even if she is found here, surely there's no way to say where she came from, that she'd snuck in at all. She moves quietly through the archway out onto the street, and turns the corner - and never sees the danger she's in until it is far too late.

Never even hears the soldier, or the spell he casts. A hint of brightness from the corner of her eye, with just enough time to turn - and then searing pain where the fireball glances against her arm, and she is thrown off her feet, the breath knocked out of her as she hits the ground hard.

"Well, what do we have _here_, sneaking around in the dark?"

Flat on her back and still blinking away stars, Penelo can barely register the snarl, let alone try to think of a response. Before her head clears, she's roughly yanked off the ground by her burned arm, agony flaring through the lingering confusion as she lets out a shocked yelp.

"Damned brats running wild across the whole damn city. Scurrying little… nothing but plague-ridden _vermin_." He's talking at her, not to her - she knows what it sounds like, to be less than a person in an Archadian's eyes, though it's hard to hear him at all around the thudding of her heart. "… have ways of dealing with rats."

"I'm not…" Penelo tries to speak, hissing as she's yanked forward again. Migelo's trusted her with a healing spell - rare, with magick rationed as it is - but it's hard to cast while hurt without considerable concentration and Penelo can barely even keep her feet, the man much taller than her and all but lifting her off the ground as he drags her down the street. "Please… I can explain… please…"

"You there!" The man bellows, and a soldier steps into sight.

"Yes, Judge Hasard."

The word connects, dread creeping up on her before Penelo even realizes what she's heard, that this could be much, much worse than a fine or even a flogging. All because she was tired and hungry, a mere moment's inattention - and she had to go and think she was so damned clever, didn't she?

The Judge shakes her hard, all but pulling her off the ground again, and she lets out another cry of pain, fighting to stay on her feet as he suddenly shoves her forward. Only the soldier's reflexes keep Penelo from crashing into the chest plate face-first.

"I want _this_ on a transport to Nalbina, immediately!"

"Yes, sir."

"No. NO!" The scream doesn't even sound like hers, but the Judge is already walking away, and Penelo is being once again dragged along, a nightmare that can't be happening, not this fast, a fate as sudden and certain as being pitched off a cliff.

"Please, I didn't - please listen!" Penelo shouts, digging her heels into the ground, raw, blank panic reducing the world to her own pounding heart and the gauntlet digging into her arm.

"It's all right, little bird. Just keep walking."

Nothing gentle in the tone, the helm rendering any voice empty of all emotion, but even in a panic the words catch her up, and Penelo finds that she can walk again, or at least stumble. It isn't until they're alone, moving well away from the wall that the solider finally stops. Penelo stumbles forward against the iron grip, feels a fresh lick of pain from her scorched arm, so sharp she can barely even gasp, fighting to keep her teeth from chattering.

"If I let go, can you stand?"

The words make only a vague half-sense, but Penelo nods, glancing away even though her legs feel wobbly, ready to betray her, and there's no way she could run fast enough to escape.

"P-please, don't send me away. I didn't, I didn't… If you find Migelo, I can take you to him - and he'll tell you… I'm working for him. I had a job to do and I d-didn't know the gate was closing early-"

"If I'd known, I would have told you before you'd left." Helm off, and Penelo's feels a stupid sort of surprise that it's Helewys - little bird, who else calls her little bird? "We all thought you'd gone back through the east gate. You traders don't seem to need much help from us, to get where you need to."

"I wasn't… I wasn't thinking…" Aware she ought to apologize, with her heart still ready to burst and even if she knows this woman that doesn't _mean_ anything. She has orders and Penelo has nothing to bargain with and-

"Easy, now. I'd rather not have to carry you home."

A shake of her uninjured shoulder, and Penelo realizes she's swaying a little, takes a step back until she's leaning against the wall. The Archadian solider moves to her throbbing arm, and holds a hand up, Penelo sighing as the soothing, green magic trickles down into her skin.

"Better?"

"… thank you." Her heart isn't pounding quite so hard, but Penelo still isn't quite certain she's safe. "You… you said I could go home?"

The woman snorts. "I'll take you there myself. I'm not going to be the one to tell that bangaa I shipped you off, just so Hasard can pretend he's not completely buggered - pardon the phrase."

"Is… is something wrong?"

"Only for anyone unlucky enough to get in his way. He's been at it for hours now, snapping at all our heels. He's not even supposed to be on this side of the city." Helewys shakes her head, smiling slightly. "It's said they caught his son in bed with the wife of one of his instructors – the first son, and he doesn't have a spare. He'll be tossed from the Akademy for sure, and that's if the cuckold doesn't decide to put a sword through him first. So now he's got to make all our lives miserable, to keep his mind off his own."

Still quiet, the only real sound the slight shift of the soldier's armor. Penelo can feel the fine hairs still up on her arms, not at all from the colder night air, trying to banish the feel of that steel hand around her arm, jerking her along like a child's toy. How easily her life had been at the mercy of an angry stranger, how quickly he'd been ready to send her to hell.

"Is your arm all right?" Helewys is watching her, and Penelo nods, dropping her hands. The woman frowns, though it isn't at her, gaze distant. "I don't know why they shifted schedules on the gate. You need to get in like that again, knock at the door until someone answers. Make yourself known. Get Valde to speak for you, or have them call Migelo if they won't listen to reason."

"I know. I'm sorry."

"It isn't your place to apologize." Helewys says, her voice still hard but not frightening, not dangerous. "Hasard is a Judge, he ought know better."

"Are you going to get in trouble?"

A soft laugh, slightly bitter. "The last thing you stand for as a Judge is yourself. If I'm going to try and be one, I ought to act like it now." A soft sigh. "You have no reason to think well of any of us, I know that, but… it _means_ something, what we do, what we are. Or it damned well ought to."

A glance at her, and for the first time Penelo thinks she's not the only one feeling uncertain, or uncomfortable, even if it's easier to do so behind a suit of armor.

The silence they fall into is mostly companionable, moving quietly through the night. Hopefully, they'll make it to Migelo's without being seen by too many people, or Penelo knows she'll be getting questions for the next week, what she did to get in trouble with the guard, and Migelo will fret and scuff his tail in the dust and Penelo will have to think up some version of the truth to tell him that isn't actually true.

Dark enough, that they almost walk right by the couple in the dim alleyway, just a thin sliver of moonlight glancing off a paldron, and Penelo's heart is in her throat for a moment, but there's no sign of a struggle. The girl's hand is loose against the soldier's arm, the toes of her foot sliding against the back of his calf. If she wanted to get much closer, she'd have to be _inside_ his armor. Helewys makes a small, annoyed sound in the back of her throat, and then a louder, deliberate cough, her voice dry and maybe a little amused.

"So many soldiers are fond of Dalmascan stars."

The pair draw apart instantly, and the soldier steps out of the shadows first, eyes to the ground but a smirk on his face.

"Nothing quite compares."

He has the girl's hand in his, drawing her forward, but she is looking away, and Penelo has an instant's worth of recognition before Nia turns to look at her, eyes widening. The Archadians glance between them - she couldn't help the small gasp, still in shock with a hand over her mouth as Nia looks back, her gaze fixed just over Penelo's shoulder, expressionless.

Helewys breaks the silence. "You're with the seventh. Aren't you supposed to be patrolling in the north?"

"You didn't hear? We've been relieved, they're shipping us out. The Lord Consul's coming in with his own men for the palace guard."

"It's been announced?"

The soldier's laugh sends a little shiver down the back of Penelo's spine, half amusement and half worse, that she doesn't want to hear the answer.

"Why do you think they shifted the curfew? It seems our great commander-prince has come to play in the dirt awhile."

"… Vayne Solidor? Here?"

"The very same."

The name means nothing to her, but Helewys' expression locks in place, as impassive as Nia, who still won't look at her and all Penelo can seem to focus on is her hand in the soldier's, not letting go. He's handsome, tall and tan, with light brown hair and eyes a slightly darker hue - he doesn't look all that Archadian but Penelo knows she's fixed that mark on only a certain group of people, the ones who come from in and around the central city, and there are far more than that in the Empire.

"You're sure?"

"We got the order this afternoon. He's not wasting any time about it either - ships up in a sennight."

"Just like that? Gods above." A cold fist in Penelo's gut is clenching tighter at the grimness on her face, and it is a long moment before Helewys even seems to remember she's standing there, making a quick gesture to the other soldier.

"You get that girl home. It's past curfew."

He laughs again. Nia looks away, as if she's barely interested, and Penelo can see the slight, red stain, a love mark on the curve of her throat, beside the chain of the necklace. At least now, she can guess where the gift came from.

"Of course. Right away, ma'am." A nod to Penelo, a sly little smirk she doesn't return, and once again they are walking in silence, though she feels stiff and odd, the weight of the pronouncement an unstable burden to bear, and this only knowing his name.

"Who is he?" She finally gets out, better than a whisper but still quiet. "How bad? How bad is it?"

The woman shakes her head, and Penelo thinks that maybe she's not supposed to know, that there's nothing the soldier can tell her but right now she doesn't care, and it's hard not to stop where she is and demand answers.

"You don't have to be so scared." Helewys says gently, and Penelo realizes she's got her arms crossed over her chest, hugging tightly.

"Who is he?"

The woman bites her lip a little, perhaps weighing what she should say, or how to best explain it. "Vayne Solidor is the eldest son of his House, and likely heir to the Imperial throne."

The giggle comes out on its own, tight and a little frantic, surprising her, and possibly startling Helewys as well.

"Oh no, that's nothing to worry about at all."

Penelo's still trying to get over seeing Nia there in the dark, though it shouldn't be so shocking - she'd been warned as much about the girl, a dozen times by now. This news on top of that, not just some Archadian noble, but one in direct line to be their Emperor? Nothing good can come of Rabanastre being deemed so important, Penelo is sure of that, and they wouldn't send such a man if there wasn't a good reason, if they weren't planning for a future she has little way to prepare for.

"He's not…" Helewys pauses, not much comfort that she's being so careful with her words. "You hear things, but that's… you never stop hearing things about the highest Houses. Some of it's true, some of it's not, but that's all House business… do you understand?"

Penelo shakes her head, just slightly. Archadia has so many levels of politeness and rank, all rules and unspoken expectations - even before the war, merchants who did business inside Archadian borders had to train, learn to navigate the complicated requirements of selling to anyone of rank, especially within the capital city.

"House business is House business. All those great lords, they rob and cheat and cut each other to pieces, but it's games for the rich. It isn't meant to come down on our heads - mine _or_ yours. I hear Vayne Solidor plays merry hell with the lot of them, but it's their rules, and it all stays where it ought. The things they hate him for… well, to send him here…" Helewys stops, and for a moment Penelo thinks she'll say nothing more, that it's a surprise to be told even this. "He's clever more than cruel, from what I've heard. Knows how to manage things. Whatever they're on about, it may very well be for the best here in Rabanastre." Her eyes narrow. "Tell that friend of yours to keep his head down, though, and stay well occupied. They'll be looking for anyone causing trouble before his arrival, and they won't argue much over who gets shipped out, or why."

The edge of her sleeve is burned just slightly from the Judge's spell. Penelo doesn't need any more of a reminder.

* * *

"Hey there, Penelo."

Nia's voice is soft, stepping out of the shadows as they reach the end of the street, Migelo's shop only a few doors further down. Helewys glances between them, and nods a farewell. It isn't until she's well gone that Penelo even thinks of thanking her, as the thought of what might have happened makes her shiver.

It's strange to see anything but confidence or boredom on Nia's face - and Penelo realizes she's got something to hold over the other girl now. Realizes just as quickly that Nia really doesn't know her at all, to think she would ever use it. Whatever her expression, it doesn't translate well in the darkness, and Penelo watches the girl's eyes go hard and sharp.

"Well, it's all true, you know. Everything. What they say about me."

"I don't know what…"

"Sure you do." The thin smile makes her look ten years older, twenty. "What should I do, though? Be the obedient little girl? Stay here and weep over the dead and gossip at the fountains until I'm old and ugly and I hate anyone luckier than I am? I'd rather be a whore." Young again, as the smile grows sharp and proud. "Not that I'm going to make it that easy."

A hand in her pocket, a small shift of her hands, but Penelo doesn't figure it out until the slim gold band glints back at her from the dark.

"You… you _married_ him?"

Nia nods, straightening up, once more arrogant and untouchable - and Penelo thinks, just then, that it's all an act. Stupid, really, that she would think it was any other way. Nia is no more confident or certain than any of them, but the pretending is all she has. Refusing to bend, to acknowledge all the nasty whispers, and it's not that Penelo doesn't feel a little bit envious. What it would be, to just snap back at yet another piece of helpful advice from someone she barely knows, who doesn't know her at all. Knowing she's expected to find her place in a world that has shrunk so small, it sometimes feels like it would crush her to even try.

"He's not even one of them - he's from Bhujerba. It's different there, everyone knows that. When they ship out, he gets sent back home and I'm… I'm going with him."

"But…"

"I wanted to tell you, earlier, about all of it, and then… you can't say anything, Penelo. If my aunt knew, she'd lock me in the damn cellar before she'd ever let me go off with an _Archadian_."

So much loathing in the word, but it isn't for the soldiers, it isn't with the enemy who took their city and killed so many and deserve to be hated. It's for Nia's aunt, and maybe for all of Rabanastre, as if the city were a cage - and Penelo stops herself before she can let that thought go further.

"It was all a lie, wasn't it? Getting out of here together? Did you even ask anyone about finding us a ship?" It's not what she meant to say, Penelo's not sure what she meant to say, except it's the closest she's ever come to catching the girl off guard. Nia's expression falters, just for a moment, some of the defensiveness gone.

"I asked around. I did." A sigh. "It wasn't going to work, Penelo. I think you knew it all along. You weren't ever going to leave, and Keste already chickened out, weeks ago." The pity in Nia's smile makes Penelo's stomach turn. "She didn't know how to tell you, she said you danced too well to lose your dream."

It hits as hard as an unexpected blow, leaves her breathless, but Penelo needs to speak, because it's stupid, it's such a stupid-

"I'm not losing anything. It's not… I'll just find another way. What if this is a mistake? If he's not who you think he is? You're leaving _everything_ for this. What if it's not… you don't know-"

"I have to get out of here, Penelo. Whatever was home here, for me, it's been gone for a long time - and say this Consul of theirs... who knows? What changes, whether he comes or not? What would happen to us, you and me, if the Empire left tomorrow? I'd still be here with nothing, and you'd still be here…"

"I'm not alone. We get by."

It sounds better, when she doesn't have to say it out loud. When Nia isn't looking at her as if they both know better.

"Maybe you should try dancing for the soldiers. You're good enough, and I hear they pay well."

Penelo hears herself choke on a breath, hands into fists and her chin up, braced as if to take a blow or land one, she's not sure. So casually, the words said so matter-of-fact, as if it wouldn't be selling so much more, even if they never touched her, and never. Never never never. What else does she have left, that belongs to her? What is there, that she hasn't had to compromise, that hasn't simply been taken?

"I knew you were prouder than you let on." Nia smirks, though it feels as if she's letting Penelo in on the joke this time, when she never has before. An older sister, if not quite kind. "You're always so nice. I never figured out how to do that. But don't think it means they respect you for it, that you're allowed to live the way you want. You just haven't said no to the right question yet. No to the husband they pick out for you. No to the life they tell you is all you're allowed to have - and they won't understand when you're not grateful. Trust me."

Nia studies her ring for a moment more, before sliding it back off her finger, tucking it safely out of sight.

"You can either be good, Penelo, or you can be happy. Don't let them make the choice for you."

* * *

With her parents gone, the world slips into a stupid sort of nightmare logic - of running and running and never the chance of escape, always the monster behind every door.

King Raminas goes to save Dalmasca, and in the end nothing is saved.

Rabanastre does not go quietly. Few believe the Empire's story, Captain Rosenberg turned traitor, and so much hanging on the word of one young soldier who could have easily been bribed or threatened or tortured into compliance, nearly dead when they'd found him. A few admit the possibility of the captain's guilt - hell, a few _support_ him for it, there are many who felt only bitter betrayal at Raminas' agreement to sign their country away. The overwhelming sentiment is that whatever the real story might be, nothing the Empire touches can be trusted, they are liars and bastards and thieves to a man.

The city fights back. Fires and ambushes and sabotage, Dalmascans launching sneak attacks and Imperial soldiers responding in kind, and there is no way to know when or where to be safe, an explosion killing two dozen people in a market Penelo had visited only hours before. She doesn't even realize Vaan has gone out until he comes back bleeding, and she bandages him up as best she can, mostly certain he's not going to die, as the city erupts into open warfare.

Pitched battles on every street, the sound of guns and steel and screaming, the clamor of armored boots echoing against the stones. The whole house trembles from some too-close barrage of magick or artillery, and Penelo wonders if there are airships in the sky, if the Empire will simply rain down fire on them all, but she doesn't dare to look out the windows, to let anyone know she is still inside.

The fighting lasts for days, and ends only when Archadia parades a long line of rebels through the streets, announcing the capture of the leaders, those who would fight so blindly against peace and order. Penelo recognizes some of them, a few merchants, one or two craftsmen her father knew, but there are other, foreign faces in the crowd. Rozarrians, among the ringleaders - and uncertainty begins to weave its way through the city's united front.

The Judge that speaks to them from the center of town makes it clear - they believe Rozarria is behind the worst of it. Hiding behind Dalamasca to provoke the Empire, and expecting the innocent citizens of Rabanastre to bear the burden of their wrath. It might very well be true, Rozarria and their eternal feud with Archades familiar enough in the city - but there is still the matter of King Raminas, of certain treachery even so, and what is there to be done?

Archadia's verdict is clear, the rebels executed at noon. Beheaded, all of them, how the Empire chooses to deal with those who would challenge their rule. It is as close as they come to negotiation, declaring that the rebellion dies with the last of them, excused as Rozarrian interference - but should the people of Rabanastre continue to rise up, the Empire will consider them all enemies of the state.

It does not take long after that, a few uncoordinated, unsuccessful attacks, a few more public executions, Archadia's retaliation as swift and merciless as they had promised - and the rebellion fades from everyday conversation, any hint of Rozarrian support met with swift contempt. Dalmasca is no more ready to be the tool of one Empire than the host of another.

Vaan goes to see Reks once, just the once. He doesn't talk about it afterward, curls up on his bed with his gaze to the wall, and Penelo doesn't understand it, what happened, only that it is no different than all else the Empire has done to them. Blink twice, and everyone she knows is gone forever.

Migelo pays for the burial, and walks back with her afterward, slowly, stubbed claws making a ruin of the papers in his hands. He is gentle and shy, with no children of his own, and is having a difficult time finding the words, to tell her what she already knows. Penelo's parents died with nothing but debts, and now that it is certain the city will not be reduced to rubble, there is one last thing for her to lose.

"Penelo, we need to… ah, I mean…"

"I know. Do we have anywhere to go?"

"Oh of course, of course you do. I've been fixing it up a bit, even. Everything's moved out and cleaned up. It's just waiting for you."

An old storeroom, in what they're calling Lowtown now, but as long as they're very careful about what they say, it's still possible to pretend things aren't what they are. The house where Penelo was born and raised, where her brothers were born and raised, and now it's to belong to someone else, maybe even some Archadian. The tightness in her chest is unbearable, choking her. Migelo makes a nervous noise - she must look closer to tears than she feels.

"You don't want to be here when they come, Penelo. It won't do any good. If you want, we can set you up today."

"Today." Not so much a question as testing the thought, like stepping on a bridge to see if it will hold her weight, and Penelo is not sure if she is disappointed when it does.

"Vaan has his things ready. We can meet you at the shop, if you'd like."

Trying to pretend she has a choice, and his kindness almost makes her smile. Miguleo was her parents' friend too, even before Penelo was born - this cannot be any easier for him, and when she can breathe again she will thank him for everything he's done.

Penelo hadn't remembered Vaan packing. Migelo must have warned him ahead of time, must have been putting off telling her for as long as possible. The bangaa hesitates at her front door, drumming his fingers nervously along the frame.

"Take a little time, then. All that you need… for goodbyes."

It ought to be more jarring than it is, really, moving through the house. Tracing her fingers over the grooves of their kitchen table, smooth as river stones from three generations' steady use, a part of her mother's dowry. Standing here for what's going to be the last time, but Penelo's played through the memories so often by now that they've already worn thin, and silent as it is, it hardly feels like home.

Little left of value, most everything sold or pawned or traded even before her parents had gone. Penelo tries to think of the practical things that remain, candles and bandages, her father's tools, her mother's spices. Nothing more than she can carry, and there isn't all that much time, but Penelo cannot seem to move faster than a slow drift, her hands sliding over every surface she passes, as if to take some part of them with her, and seeing so little she might as well be blind.

The fourth time she wanders into her parents room - and how strange it had been to go in that first time, like disturbing some sacred shrine - Penelo thinks that maybe she is not as calm, certainly not as focused as she would like to be.

One bag for everything, her clothes, her sturdiest shoes, her work gloves. The bag is as valuable as the contents, all thin strips of woven leather, an import from Rozarria. Her father's old pack, from the days before he'd married, and it has seen every inch of Dalmasca, and far beyond. Penelo carefully wraps her mother's perfume up in her best skirt, the material of such a fine weave she hardly ever wore it. Surprising to find it, and even more so the box tucked away beneath, the inlaid pearl combs from her wedding day. Always intended for her, to be passed down when Penelo found a trader of her own - perhaps one who wished to go into rugs, her father had said, and laughed when she'd thrown a boot at him.

Penelo says a silent prayer, that they will forgive her, for thinking of the coin such beauty might bring, and another, that she will never need to part with them.

It's important not to cry on the ledger, or let her hands press too hard against the pages, smudging the careful lines of her father's script. It is only random business, nothing of consequence, but she feels as if she can almost hear him, telling her of all his successes, of those yet to come. Penelo had searched, long ago, for secret diaries, for the letters she was sure had been hidden away - but whatever had happened, her father had been certain they would return.

It is difficult, here where no one will ever know, not to hate him a little for that.

A mistake, to leave what is most fragile and valuable for last, though Penelo doesn't realize how slick her palms are until the sphere slips right through her fingers. A jolt goes through her body as it cracks hard against the floor, rolling away from her under the bed. A snow globe, a marvelously beautiful, silly gift for a girl who'd never known anything but the sands.

Penelo had spent ages shaking it up, watching the sparkling storm swirl around the small village, the tiny chocobo with its blanket, resting in the stable. Making up whole worlds as intently as she curses now, arm stretched out and hissing in stupid panic. Knowing the boards will be soaked where it's broken, that she'll end up with nothing but a palm full of glass but Penelo can't stop the frantic search. Can't breathe, can't stop crying, even as her hand closes around the smooth, cool glass, and she draws her arm back and sits up, running her fingertips over its surface. Searching for the crack she knows must be there as she swallows a sob, more tears reducing the tiny town and the roiling chaos into a sparkling blur.

Ask her where the idea came from, and Penelo couldn't say. It must have always been there, simply jolted free at the thought of losing what was really so small a thing, just a silly memento, of having one more memory turn irrevocable.

It still seems like a perfectly reasonable idea, or at least what she _is_ going to do, regardless. Penelo carefully packs the glass sphere with its little world, picks up her quarterstaff, and moves from room to room, laying waste to everything that remains. All that she can do, as the last of her family, that no Archadian will touch a single pot or glass, and she even does a fair job getting most of the doors off their hinges, smashing the tiles in the kitchen, upending the table, kicking the legs free.

At the last, she shatters each of the windows, glass cracking beneath her boots as she picks up her bag, wipes her eyes dry, and walks down the stairs and to the door.

Penelo leaves it open behind her, and doesn't look back.

* * *

A sharp wail greets her, before she's made it more than a few steps into Lowtown, the little girl threatening to trip over each uneven stone as she flings herself at Penelo's legs, howling through her tears. Utterly unintelligible, though the greenish, sticky blob where blonde hair ought to be tells Penelo all that she needs to know. The nuts that fall from the scrub brush aren't good for much else but mischief, and it only takes a quarter-hour to gather enough sap to wreak a considerable amount of havoc. Less time if, like her brothers, one could count on an accomplice for help.

"It's all right, it's going to be fine." Penelo says soothingly. "Do you know who did this?"

The girl shakes her head, fat tears still falling down her cheeks. Penelo never volunteered to play big sister, but that never stopped anyone from showing up at their door. She and Vaan are two of the older orphans in Lowtown – funny to think that anyone would look up to them, would look to them for comfort, let alone guidance, but there it is. Always at least a few faces at the door, looking for a meal, wanting to tell her a story. Even a few times she's been able to put them to work on some small task, and they'd held the few gil she passed out after like priceless treasure.

Her father's legacy, to help the people she can, that what she's got to spare can be passed around, that there are always those worse off than she is, without any chance to fend for themselves. Penelo can help, and if she's tired and sore and not interested in scolding or making things right - well that just doesn't matter, does it?

"It's okay." Penelo says gently, before she can start crying again. "Poor girl, and I bet you've been waiting for me all this time."

Penelo thinks through her business for the evening, pushing everything back as she herds the little girl toward the door. Someone's burned their stew again, the smell carrying heavy along the corridor, and it's a relief to get the door open - and then Penelo realizes the smell is coming from their place.

"It's still good. I promise. Well, mostly." Vaan says around a mouthful of food, Kytes nowhere in sight but Filo carving a slice off the slightly stale bread she'd managed to add in as part of her last trade. "We were going to wait for you, but then it got late - what's with her?"

"Sapnuts." Penelo glares at the younger boy. "I don't suppose you know anything about it?"

Filo is the picture of perfect innocence, but who lives down here who hasn't mastered that look? Penelo sighs, no use trying to find a culprit tonight, not that it will change anything. She lifts the girl onto a low chair, to get a better view of the problem. "Migelo was looking for you, Vaan. Where did you go?"

"Out." He says, shrugging, and Penelo fights the urge to glare at him. "Where were you?"

Very tempting to respond in kind. Certainly too weary to bother with the whole story, when Vaan needs no new reasons to be angry.

"He needed me to run an errand. It took a little longer than I thought."

The news of the new Lord Consul hadn't reached the bangaa yet, and Penelo hadn't had the heart to tell him. Better that he get at least one more good night's sleep. She gingerly combs her fingers through the girl's hair, the feel of it no better than the smell, sticky and slimy and sickly-sweet, and it doesn't take long to see there's no salvaging this.

"It looks like we'll have to cut it out."

Did she have such impressive lungs at that age, or is just the close quarters making the outraged howl ring off the stones? Vaan scoops his plate up and walks out, with Filo running after, hands over his ears, and Penelo waits until the girl has run out of energy for her tantrum. It doesn't take long, as late as it is, until she's rubbing at her eyes, sniffling softly as Penelo digs out a pair of scissors.

"It's all right, it will be better soon." She says, well aware there won't be more than a quarter-inch left when she's done trimming, if that. Aware of how much she sounds like her mother, a voice of confidence, when Penelo knows so little and is in control of even less. "You know, my brothers did this to me when I was your age."

"Yeah?"

"Mm-hm. By the time my mother had finished, I had no hair left to cut - but everyone said it grew back twice as pretty as before."

And her brothers had been sent off to muck out cockatrice pens, the dangers of a mother with friends outside the city.

It's nice to have a task to focus on, disgusting as it is, and the girl asks her more questions and Penelo pays only half-attention to her answers - all the little ones like to know about Rabanastre before the war. The story of Princess Ashelia's wedding grows grander with each retelling, she more beautiful and he more handsome, and Nabudis a fallen paradise.

Penelo glances around for a distraction as she reaches the end of her task, with all of the girl's hair in a pile and next to nothing on her head. Pure luck, to spy a hat she'd picked up from some trade, second or third-hand, and it's far too big for the girl but it makes her happy, and there's a lack of mirrors in Lowtown either way.

A call comes from down the hall, just as Penelo has finished, and the girl giggles and scampers out. The littlest children are left mostly to their own devices during the day, watched over at night by a few of the church's more patient disciples.

Penelo wipes off the scissors and her hands as best she can, and sighs, leaning back, stretching out her spine. Lifting one leg up slowly, bent at the knee and then pointed straight out, and then up as far as she can go, for the sheer pleasure of being able to do so, bringing her arms up and turning into a graceful spiral, and some day, some day she'll be able to dance until she's exhausted, instead of the other way around.

A war between hunger and weariness, with curiosity helping hunger along, if only to see the wreck that two disinterested boys could make of dinner. Penelo spears her meal straight from the lukewarm pot, the sauce mostly flavorless save for where the spices clump together in searing blasts. Little meat to be had, of course, and even half-burned, the potatoes are no more than partly cooked, crunchy at the centers. Penelo keeps eating, determined not to waste what's left, but she's grateful there's still an orange waiting for her afterward, and one for the morning.

Migelo's gifted them with a considerable amount of room for Lowtown, though the larger space is kitchen and common room both, as well as overflow storage when the bangaa runs out of options. The other, smaller room lies at the end of a long hall, so narrow she has to turn sideways to make the journey - through two doors she can lock behind her, to a small space for all that they own, with a ladder to an L-shaped upper alcove.

"Vaan?"

Curtains hung up for a little privacy there, though they aren't so much rooms as large shelves in the walls, little space for more than a small bed. A mutter from Vaan behind his, more than half-asleep, which means Penelo can strip down and hang her clothes up to air, pausing for a moment to examine the singed spot. Considering how to mend it as she does her best at a scrub down, a pail of water from the kitchen and the tiniest sliver of soap from a bar she's managed to make last for nearly four months.

It is what counts for luxury now, perhaps even snobbery, to care so much for how she looks - and did Nia truly think she had no pride? What, because Penelo hadn't found some Archadian to marry?

_No, Bhujerban_. As if it makes that great a difference.

Penelo takes a breath, scrubbing hard, bitterness mixing with all the worries that have been lurking in the corners of her mind, just waiting for her to try to catch her breath.

If all the gates get new soldiers, when the Lord Consul arrives, that means learning all over again who she can trust, and who might have her locked away forever on a whim. If this Vayne Solidor is at all like the Judges – gods, there are so many ways it could go wrong. Penelo has heard too many conversations, those who see Lowtown as a slum, a garbage pile, a den of thieves - that they ought to be 'dealt' with. What if he agrees? What if this is how he proves his worth, to those who expect him to do great things?

A clatter from the other side of the wall barely breaks her train of thought, the sound of scuffling footsteps, a shout, what is likely a fight. Vaan doesn't even stir. Amazing, what they can get used to – and if she could go back, tell herself what was coming, Penelo knows the girl she was would have never believed she could live through it. Is that what Nia saw - or thinks she saw? Penelo has survived, so she'll accept anything as her due?

It would be so much easier to think the worst of her, that Nia had been judged as harshly as she was because she deserved it. Frightening to imagine otherwise, that the girl never threw her reputation away, because it never really belonged to her in the first place. If she might be right, all that scorn and censure just waiting for Penelo to disagree, to want more from life than simply to endure it.

Penelo unbraids her hair, running her fingers through to catch the worst of the dust before wetting it down, humming a little to herself, quietly. It will be a pain, finding another place to dance - and the thought comes, and the jealousy hurts, that the next that Nia dances it will be a place well fit for the purpose, with a proper dress in a polished hall. If she regrets her decision, her new husband, she can do so from a hot bath, can feel homesick as she picks over a warm meal. Bhujerba is of the clouds, the only way to get there is by airship. Nia will be touching the sky, while Penelo sleeps down under the ground, and there's the thought, not worth thinking, that until something grows, there's little difference between being planted and being buried.


	12. private atonement, unremembered past  1

The sky over the Dalmascan desert is the blue of dreams. Vayne stretches his arms out against the back of the transport, leans back and looks up and feels that he could easily fall into it. Not a soul in Rabanastre to wish him well, yet the land does not care. How ungrateful it is to its people, to unfurl such beauty before him on this day.

He chose the route across the desert, demanded it - slow and plain and far less dramatic than descending like some sort of conquering god aboard the Ifrit. It is no less calculated, to come in at their level, an open-decked ship with little in the way of cover. Everything he does is analyzed for hidden meaning, every gesture, every glance, so he might as well work it to his own advantage when he can. The escort standing at the prow is nervous, though whether it is Vayne's presence or the potential for unexpected trouble, who can say.

Unlikely that the people here will be as interested in purely reactive decisions as the rest of the world has been thus far. Archadian politics is much like a chocobo that refuses to hatch out of its shell, nothing more valuable than maintaining a facade of neutrality in a conflict, until it's clear who the winner will be. Few choices are actually made based on the information at hand, or taking initiative - it is far more about speed and anticipation, knowing one's opponent - and luck, more blind luck than anyone will ever admit to.

Which means Vayne can often be telling the absolute truth at the same time that he is lying, and that the Empire is simultaneously working to secure lasting peace in Dalmasca, while at the same time positioning for strategic advantage, giving Rozarria a detailed view of just what they can expect should things collapse into war.

The world at present rests upon a knife's edge. One breath, a single movement this way or that, may determine the entire future of Ivalice.

So Vayne is sent, after heated and near-endless debate, to stand as Lord Consul of Rabanastre - quite possibly just to see what will happen next. Given the time it usually takes for the Senate and the Emperor to bat an issue back and forth, using it for whatever political spite or gain might come before tossing what remains aside to molder, two years is practically overnight.

The Senate protested, because they protest everything he does, as sure he is ever working against them as his father is, and that even placing him between themselves and the enemy might not lessen the danger. It is perhaps Vayne's greatest asset - he is entirely unpredictable, or at least they think it so. The thought that he might even defect, might forge a secret alliance with Rozarria - of all things - and raise an army against the Emperor is not at all out of the realm of possibility. _Nothing_ is impossible. Vayne's goals remain entirely undefined in their eyes, only that he has power that he is not visibly wielding, and that means he is capable of anything.

"Well, if nothing else, this consul business will certainly improve Rozarria's odds of sending pieces of you back to your father."

The good doctor, who knew far more about where Vayne chose to extend his influence than most, had to be tracked down in his private lab before he'd left. Diffident disinterest was a laughably poor mask for Cid's anxiety, scowling and fretting over him while pretending to do anything but.

"One a week." He finally said, holding up a syringe, practically glowing gold in the light. "Two if you must, but let me know afterward. You should have enough for at least three months. I will ship more once you have settled."

"Cid."

"If anything happens, if it isn't working as well as-"

"Cid."

"Tell me right away, and I'll be there."

"I never remember you fussing so much before you got old."

Cid glared, finally throwing him a gesture that most did not see fit to grace the Imperial family with - at least where they could see it - and as pleasant a farewell as Vayne could ask for.

The small vials are his most precious and secret possession now. The tick of a metronome, each granting yet one more small portion of what is left of his life. Cid had taken what remained of the Viera's unexpected gift and is processing it slowly, studying it as he goes - and thinning it out as far as can be managed without losing its potency.

In the lack of any new developments, there will be enough for slightly less than sixty vials. Which means Vayne will be dead not long after his first anniversary as consul. Assuming, of course, that he lasts that long.

He might very well die today. Who is to say? Hopefully, they'll be polite enough to let him make it at least halfway through the speech, after all the time he spent composing it.

Vayne rolls his right wrist, flexing his hand, rubbing a thumb against each of his fingertips, just to make sure the feeling is still there, working the muscles against the constant threat of stiffness. The desert sun feels very good - it is somewhat difficult to keep warm these days, the fragments of the Midlight Shard an ever-present chill, chips of ice burning ever away beneath his skin. It is little more than an annoyance, Cid's research providing the means to live at equilibrium, at least for now.

The doctor believes this was entirely of his doing and design, and therefore must believe that he can fix it. Vayne keeps his doubts quiet, the feeling of being ever so slightly off balance, the cold bite that reaches, now and then, all the way down to his bones. He is not so certain he even has a year, but he will lie and it is done for kindness' sake. Cid is doing all that he can, Vayne will not shatter his friend's hopes until there is no choice.

It is not worth much dwelling on, either way - he has time, that is the important thing, the time to do what he must. Secure a place for Larsa that cannot be overthrown. Find the Sun-Cryst and destroy it - the Occuria will try again, he is sure of that, and even if that weapon should stay hidden, there are two more Shards that must be dealt with. Must be found, and though the Dawn Shard rests safely in King Raithwall's tomb by all best estimations, the Dusk Shard's location is far less clear. It had been a foolish conceit, to ever believe they would be able to count on Venat's continued assistance.

"Sir, we are approaching the gates of Rabanastre."

Ah yes, and for the moment he must convince an entire city's worth of angry, frightened people - his unwilling subjects - not to start throwing rocks at him. He has maybe ten seconds, once he begins talking, to provide them with an alternate suggestion.

* * *

"… What I ask, I ask plain. My hopes now rest with you."

Vayne's got them.

Or at least, they have no idea what to make of him, which is more than good enough for now. The applause is an amusing surprise - mildly gratifying, if unnecessary. He hardly expects them to abide by it for long. Dalmasca is like a wounded animal backed into a corner, if he but raises his hand it will surely run mad, preferring utter annihilation to any further uncertainty. It is a difficult thing to live life beneath the sword's edge, ever wondering when it might fall. Yet Vayne has provided another option - expecting the tyrant, they have been given the servant, and though it will take no time at all for half of them to decide he is a liar, it is clear they are no longer unified by their fear of a faceless, despotic Consul.

He has proven himself but a man. Stepped into the crowd, to meet them at their own level. An amusing contradiction, taking control by showing his vulnerability. The gesture is a small one, but it is always the unexpected concessions that carry the most weight. Easy to fight force in kind, but far more difficult to slap away the open hand.

Vayne can't help but enjoy the puzzle of it, the simple intellectual challenge of moving those who do not wish to be moved, easing their fears, securing their trust. More troublesome, perhaps, than a simple show of force, more complicated than wielding fear like a cudgel, and yet, nearly always worth the extra investment of thought and time. The proof of his theories, of what he thinks he knows of the world will be writ across this new holding of the Empire. Rabanastre is his trial by fire, in more ways than one.

Of course, those who would call him liar are not entirely wrong. As is all too often the case, the truth is not interested in being Vayne's ally. No one in Dalmasca would be comforted with the knowledge that their lives were overturned, their loved ones sent to die in battle, all because they were _in the way_. That the taking of Dalmasca is simply a repositioning for the battle that may still come to their gates, that this is Rozarria's decision as much as it is the Empire's. In the greater scheme of things it is crystal-rich Bhujerba that can be the only other active player in this game.

Still, Rabanastre is truly a beautiful city, and he says as much to the solider who asks. Amazing, that the men here have kept to full plate armor for as long as they have without mounting a protest. Or perhaps they're too hot to bother. A rather brilliant notion there, the heavy suits and helms rendering them inhuman and absurdly menacing while increasing the chance of heatstroke tenfold. If Vayne knew nothing else about the Judge in charge of the city guard, it would be enough.

He is introduced to the organizer of the night's fete, officially welcoming him to the city, an exceedingly nervous bangaa who's very obviously _not_ been looking forward to meeting him all day. Miguelo stumbles awkwardly through his introduction, refreshingly bad at formality. As eldest son and prospective heir to the Empire, Vayne has no less than sixteen separate titles and there are those in Archades who can and have rattled them off without hesitation, in declining levels of importance depending on whether it is a civil or military ceremony.

All the better, that this is not Archades.

The offer of simply addressing him by name is quickly rebuffed, though Vayne assumed as much. A certain distance between the people and their leaders is more comfortable for everyone, though the exact dimensions of that space will no doubt be up for near-constant debate. He still offers up the promise of sharing a drink together, though Vayne is certain he will want to far more than he will actually be able to indulge. The world obliges his suspicions, and he catches a movement as he turns away, a figure in the crowd from the corner of his eye. He can't even say what it is, the speed or economy of movement, a certain stiff tension - either the Resistance, Bhujerbian spy or Rozarrian agitator. No doubt all will be in attendance tonight.

As much as the Senate did not want to allow him to take the position, Vayne is sure they are now depending on him to be conveniently murdered as soon as possible. A shame if it should happen at the fete, his poor host seems worn out from just having to say hello.

* * *

It is much cooler inside the palace, stone walls open up on little fountains here and there, hidden grottos set in unexpected places that keep the air fresh and clean. An open layout, there are many windows overlooking gardens - he did not expect it to be so green, an abundance of plants well-tended. An old gardener gives him as close as possible to the evil eye without putting himself in danger of being called on it. Vayne was hardly exaggerating his expectations, anything further than their grudging tolerance of him entirely unnecessary. If it had ever been his pleasure to be praised by sycophants, he might as well have stayed at home.

If there is any pressing necessity, it is in securing this place enough that Larsa might soon be able to visit. Vayne had hoped his little brother might prove slightly easier to corral than he was at that age, but fate stands ever in need of her amusements, and it is simply not to be. Larsa has at least been obedient enough to take a proper guard with him on any public outing, but the boy is past fifteen now and will not be kept away from anything as exciting as Rabanastre for long.

The heirs to an empire of conquerors, and yet the both of them are most pleased just to see anyplace that is new. It is fortunate that, apart from possessing it so that Rozarria does not, the Empire has little interest in claiming Dalmasca herself. There will be no great alterations made, nothing planned to bring this place in line with more Archadian standards of culture or decorum.

It is rare that Vayne does not feel a weight at his heels, one ghost or another, and no surprise that Raminas' memory would be here with him now, all this beauty through the imagined, wistful reminiscence of one no longer here to enjoy it. The king's words echo in the quiet corners of every room - _judge her kindly_ - and it is very beautiful and he was right to love it dearly. Vayne hopes his appreciation will provide enough satisfaction for Raminas' troubled spirit, he doubts there will be much left of him to exact revenge on in the next world, once the rest of his sins have been accounted for.

The palace is not his home, and even if it were there would be little point to giving a speech full of concession and understanding only to turn around and repurpose the rooms to Archadian design. It is an easy way to avoid conflict, and so Vayne touches nothing. Only one modest room, conveniently placed, has been stripped and decorated to recognize the origin of his authority, and that only a few banners with the Solidor crest, a large desk where he expects to spend far too much of his time. It is there that he meets the architects of the past two years, the civil and military authorities for a transition no one expected to last as long as it had.

"Judge Telkiris. Captain Rhedan. It is good to finally meet you both."

An old joke of sorts, Archades so martial that even the civil servants are soldiers. Unsurprisingly, it all comes down to matters of lineage - Judges tend to come from the Hundred Houses, a combination of skill and family caste naturally leading to an exalted position. Becoming a Judge Magister almost certainly requires being in the Hundred, if not the highest Thirty Names, although there have been a few cases - Gabranth comes to mind - where specific qualifications managed to edge out heredity.

So while both men are from a military background, they might as well exist in different worlds, and it takes no more than a glance to be sure they are well aware of it - tense, the anger a palpable thing. Unlikely they would be in the same room together, were it to mark anything less than his arrival. It has likely been a very interesting two years.

"Lord Consul, it is truly an honor to welcome you to Rabanastre."

Telkiris speaks first, and he is all calculated smiles and arrogant self-confidence and Vayne tries not to give all weight to the initial moment, but there is little to make him hold out hope. Rhedan does not smile, only bows, hand over heart. Younger than the Judge by a few years, younger even than Vayne himself, but with an air of studied, serious contemplation and it seems that - in his first impression - he has found his new Lord Consul badly wanting.

Vayne likes him already.

"It is an honor, Your Eminence. I must say, when we had heard… that is, we were hardly expecting…"

Expecting to be rewarded for two years faithful, unappreciated service by having an Imperial heir dropped in the middle of a fragile peace? No, he imagines not.

"The Emperor can be quite… capricious. Even I was not sure that I might find myself here, yet my wise father believes I may stand to learn a great deal from this land and its people."

A soft, derisive snort from Telkiris, and Rhedan bristles openly, anger flashing in his dark eyes, gaze fixed purposefully on the floor. Vayne keeps his own expression blank, neither condoning nor condemning, all the better to let things play out as they will.

"I fear you will find little here but sand and stubborn fools who believe it is worth fighting over." Telkiris says dismissively. "I have heard this place once stood at the center of civilization, yet I can hardly imagine _how_."

"It seems peaceable enough. I hear you still have some difficulties with the resistance."

"Insurgence, milord. A scruffy band of deluded cut-throats and thieves hiding themselves behind false allegiances. I assure you, they have been well and thoroughly dealt with."

"Lord Consul," Rhedan steps in, his angry gaze fixed anywhere but on Vayne. "Before your arrival, a good number of men were rounded up off the streets and sent to Nalbina in the guise of being rebels. Far too many for a proper interrogation to have taken place. I believe most of them to be wholly innocent and-"

Telkiris takes a dangerous step forward, close to looming over the captain. So far, Vayne has said nothing, and it is not a surprise the Judge has translated this in his favor. "You would risk the life of His Excellency for the lives of a few meaningless-"

"The people of Rabanastre are Imperial citizens and ought be treated as such!" It is said too loud, with a quaver of rage, directed at more than the Judge though he is the one Rhedan is glaring at. No doubt they've skipped ahead to the middle of their usual fight. If Vayne were to step back and tell them to duel it out, he believes they would be happy to oblige him. At least Telkiris has been kind enough to be so unthinkingly forward, so he can be confident he is not missing much by cutting things short.

"You have done excellent work here as a Judge of Archades, in reestablishing order and peace. I cannot imagine it was easy."

The man preens. Rhedan has gone pale, looking back down to the floor, doing an admirable job of hiding an impressive anger. It is likely he has been serving in the Judge's shadow since the moment he arrived. Rhedan is a relatively low House, little in the way of power or prestige. Connected enough to attain this position, yet Vayne is fairly certain it was not bestowed as any particular compliment.

"It is an honor to serve, Lord Consul. It has been no great difficulty, I assure you. The people of Dalmasca seem full of fire, but it is easy enough to bring them to heel."

Easy enough to pretend it, at least. Vayne nods. "I imagine you would like to make final preparations for the security of tonight's celebration, and I would like to have a few words in private with the captain."

Telkiris sneers knowingly, and thankfully the promise of his civil counterpart's impending humiliation, disgrace and destruction is enough to speed his departure. Vayne waits until the door is closed, and moves to sit behind his desk - _his_ desk, shipped direct from Archades, with his chair and his papers and the special compartment in the bottom drawer where he keeps a flask of what one of the technicians at Draklor brews for himself and a few close allies. Clear spirits distilled through the repurposed cooling system of an airship and flavored with - Cid claims - the tears of students who fail their combined organic chemistry cohort. It has all the gentle charm of a punch to the face.

Vayne leans back slightly, folds his hands on the desk, and looks up.

"I hope you might advise me on an alternate, to fill his post once he is gone." He never gets tired of going against expectations, the way Rhedan's eyes rip up from the floor so fast Vayne's surprised the carpet doesn't come with them. "It needs not be a Judge, though the rank-and-file seem to heed them more often."

It takes the man another moment to realize this is actually happening, that he likely ought respond. "… what?"

"Judge Telkiris is second nephew to the brother-in-law of Judge Magister Zargabaath's wife."

One has to be an Archadian, to truly appreciate how many levels of obligation there are in that statement, and just who would raise the loudest protests, and which Houses could be counted on to rally the Senators among them and then it would be months of argument and they would surely summon him back to Archades and Vayne does not have the time or the inclination to bother with the wounded egos of useless men.

"It is impossible, that he would ever be allowed to leave here in disgrace. Yet if we do as he suggests, and put our boot on the throat of Rabanastre, we will have this same conversation tomorrow, and next month, and next year - how to defeat the rebellion we have already defeated. I find that to be unacceptable."

The man's not at all an idiot for staring. Vayne's just bludgeoned him over the head with the realization that the Lord Consul is on his side, and it will take a moment for his worldview to make the proper adjustments.

"Would you like to sit down?"

Vayne's placed himself in the chair so that the captain can look down on him, though he is likely too rattled to realize it yet. Once again sacrificing a little authority, in the hope of gaining some trust. Being feared is mostly worthless, simply the best way to be the _last_ one to know when things go wrong.

"… no. No, I… that is, thank you, your Grace."

"Call me Vayne, if you like. We are to be working together now, there seems little reason for titles."

He can practically hear the click, as Rhedan's thoughts snap back into place, finally rejoining him fully in the present. Watching him with barely-concealed wariness, that Vayne has proven himself more dangerous than simply another obstacle to be worked around. "I do not think… I mean… you ought call me Loren then, Lord Consul."

Close enough for now, to at least be bureaucrat rather than prince. Captain Loren does finally sit, though awkwardly, obviously trying not to stare.

"You're really going to remove Judge Telkiris?"

"I'm going to promote Judge Telkiris. Back to Archades, where he may enjoy his favored degree of civilization, and no doubt continue in his life's work of being passed around to where he can do as little damage as possible."

Which will happen as soon as the Resistance the Judge has handily 'defeated' make their first appearance and try to take Vayne's head off. It can't possibly be long in coming.

Loren frowns. "Of course, he must return a hero."

Far likelier that Telkiris will be happy to scuttle quietly away, but there's no reason to spoil that surprise. A man as sympathetic to Dalmasca as Loren seems to be… well, it seems unlikely that he has turned traitor to Archades, but that would certainly make things very interesting indeed.

"I am sure you would agree, we have far more important business than the destiny of a single Judge. I doubt I have the time now for a full report, but I'd like to hear at least a few thoughts on Rabanastre. How have you found it, these past two years?"

He is slow to start, and self-editing every word he speaks, Vayne can all but see him do it, but the longer he keeps quiet the more comfortable Loren is in filling the silence. One of those lessons he's tried to pass on to his brother: when in doubt,_ listen_. Pay attention, and know when to step back and keep out of the way. Amazingly, for a good deal of the time this is all people want from their leaders.

Loren's views speak to what he's already read in the reports, Rabanastre is in fairly decent shape, all things considering. No recurrences of the plague that swept through a few years ago, though Archades could bring some advancements to medical technology that would not go unwanted. Literacy is surprisingly solid through all but the lowest classes, though there's not quite the same emphasis on a standard structure or demand for higher, specialized education. Most of the captain's criticism is, not surprisingly, on Telkiris' habits and techniques, an unsurprisingly aggressive approach that Loren believes undoes most of the work he tries to do in gaining public support. It is not surprising for a Judge to view this as a matter of simple conquest, forgetting that this is meant to be a permanent change. Dalmasca as an Archadian outpost loyal to the Empire, and whoever will stay here in the capital must not always be looking toward home.

Other than that, it is little different than any other city, although on a far smaller scale than anything in Archades. Infrastructure in need of upkeep and repair, roads and bridges that need building, and, as always, more civil projects than there is money to complete them. Vayne will find out the particular measure of work-to-graft later, and just what this city considers an acceptable level of corruption, how he might strive to curtail that as well.

The captain reaches the end of what he is able or willing to say, and though he tries to maintain a facade of polite indifference, it is obvious he wants a few answers of his own.

"It is only fair that I give you what I can in return. Ask what you like."

Loren wrings his hands, a nervous tic, his voice more hesitant than before. Unnecessary worry, when Vayne's fairly sure where this conversation is headed.

"Can you tell me… I mean, what exactly is going on here, sir? We were aware they'd send someone eventually, but… well, no one ever thought it would be you."

It had gotten to the point where Vayne was ready to just sneak in, had they not made him Consul. Ghis has already been here at least twice, no doubt looking for the Dusk Shard, though it seems he has yet to uncover it. It is possible, of course, that Raminas secreted it away long ago, which is at least a better fate than seeing it in the hands of a Judge.

"What do you know about Nethicite, captain?"

The man blinks, and shrugs slightly. "I've heard it's some new form of skystone, modified to work with the ships' engines. Stops the effects of the Jagd. It's said they're reconverting much of the fleet to incorporate it. Other than that… just legends and fairy stories. Tales of the Dynast-King and all, quite popular in the city."

What Vayne's life has come to be these days, two-thirds economics and one-third epic poetry. Who knows where the Occuria are, if they are even now forming new plans of attack, or if they will simply wait Vayne out before moving on with whatever strange business they call their own. Heaven knows they have the time to be patient.

"Nearly all of the high-grade Magicite used in Archadian airships comes from the Lhusu mines in Bhujerba. Generally speaking, it requires a ratio of one point-two-six kilo raw ore to a corresponding kilo of usable material. At least a third of what's left unused can be compressed and reprocessed. Manufacturing Nethicite requires a three-point-five to one ratio, and can only be created using pure-ore Magicite, with no compressed remainder - it all burns away in the refining process. Simply put, every kilo of Manufacted Nethicite we require makes near-triple the profit for Bhujerba."

Loren frowns. "But they are our ally."

"Bhujerba is its own ally. Until now there has been a profitable alliance between us, but Marquis Ondore's coffers are newly flush and he sees further opportunity for… expansion. We cannot engage them directly in any sort of martial action without endangering the Magicite, he knows it as well as we do. So Ondore is taking advantage of his position, to encourage Rozarria's advance. He wishes to have them be the wedge, to free himself from any obligation to the Empire, and thus renegotiate his terms."

Getting Rozarria in the Nethicite business would simply be icing on the cake. An arms race that would never end, and would leave Bhujerba as the wealthiest and most powerful nation-state in all Ivalice.

The captain shakes his head. "He would not do this, not with Dalmasca in the middle. The Marquis was close friends with King Raminas."

Ondore was also funding Rozarrian spies, before Archades ever moved toward Nabradia. 'Close friends' is one of those wonderfully flexible terms without any certain values, or requirements. It is unkind to speak ill of the dead, but Vayne has to wonder about the kind of man who would consider Ondore fully trustworthy - or perhaps Raminas simply had no choice. The Marquis' power, his influence - the king may have felt there was some security there, and learned too late that Ondore never took a hit he could leave for another.

"Fueling a cold war between Rozarria and Archades is entirely in his interests. We could redraw the borders a dozen times over the next decade, pushing back and forth, and all our effort goes straight into his coffers. The more independent Bhujerba is, the more direct business he can have with Rozarria, and the higher price he can ask for his Magicite. I was sent here, so Ondore would see just how serious Archades is about holding Dalmasca. Also, I have had the benefit of working quite closely with the Draklor Laboratories in Archades, and Doctor Cid."

"The airship expert?" If the word 'insane' is hidden within that question, Loren has buried it with all due politeness. Good man.

"Sections of the Estersand may prove useful for long-term airship storage. Possibly even new construction - there's a ship he's been thinking of, a supply and repair depot we'd permanently float nearby. The Bahamut - an air platform. It will work as a way of lessening some of our dependence on docking at Bhujerba, and to remind Rozarria of where the line has been drawn. Cid is hoping we might power it with the Mist released from the disaster at Nabudis. If that area could be rendered more hospitable, we may one day reclaim it."

Loren's mouth compresses into a very thin line.

"You are preparing for war."

"I am preparing for a long and tedious stalemate, with loud threats and very little action. I am preparing to find ways to make Dalmasca truly valuable to the Empire. Do understand, if Rozarria moves and we counter, if Bhujerba pushes and it is to be true conflict between us, we will have it with Rabanastre as our vanguard or we will have the war _on top of them_."

Times like this, where Vayne doesn't care if he frightens the hell out of people, because Loren is quite pale which means the man believes him, and he won't have to repeat himself. He lets the words hang for a moment, but it is not all doom and destruction.

"I am not fond of failure, captain. It does not much agree with me. I would consider it quite a grand defeat indeed, even with the war won, to be Lord Consul of what _was once_ a beautiful city."

Vayne will defend Dalmasca, as he vowed to its people, and if not for purely noble and altruistic reasons than because he already likes it here, only a few hours after arriving. Because his success will irritate the Marquis to no end, and because neither his father nor the Senate actually thinks he can do it. What weight the whole of Rabanastre's scorn, when measured up against hearing great Archades grumble?

"You have some men and women of Dalmasca among your staff, captain. I want the names of your most loyal of these, so that they and their families can be granted full Archadian citizenship, including passage across the whole of the Empire."

Loren was speaking more poetic hope than legal fact, when he'd claimed all Dalmascans as free Imperial citizens, yet Vayne will gladly start it here. Let the people benefit a bit, and see if they might see opportunity rather than endless oppression in their future. It may take a bit more time, to see the first of Rabanastre's own Judges, yet he trusts he will live long enough to see that day as well.

"Sir, yes sir. Of course."

A knock at the door. Vayne stands and Loren follows, the expression on his face far different than when he had entered. He may consider his Lord Consul slightly unhinged - and really, who doesn't - but at least Vayne is no longer quite the disappointment he had seemed. He wrings his hands again, glancing down at the floor and back up, still not able to hold his gaze.

"Sir, that is… tonight, I would introduce my wife to you, may it please your grace."

"It would be my honor."

* * *

Author's Notes

1. I upped Larsa's age by a bit, for the oncoming Penelo/Larsa bits because yes.

2. I changed Bahamut's design to something a bit more logical and functional because I don't care how far gone Cid was, I can't imagine him ever signing off on something that irredeemably, unnecessarily fugly.


	13. private atonement, unremembered past  2

Part Two

* * *

Dalmasca doesn't do aspics.

Vayne is never leaving.

The amount of food on display is considerable, even if he is familiar with less than half the dishes on the table. It isn't so much a formal dinner as an assembly, which unfortunately means he can't actually eat any of it, as he's been shaking hands consistently for nearly an hour, with little sign that there will be any ready pause. Archadian Guilds do not shake hands, preferring to send representatives who make deals and then send other representatives who claim the deals were never made, making new offers at twice the price. It is surely more like Balfonheim here, where it's all about handshakes and shared, steady looks between those in charge, and any man stupid enough to think themselves above it, no matter how powerful they might be, will find themselves quickly shut out of any worthwhile trade.

It is also a good deal like Balfonheim, with how little some of those in attendance are wearing. The Dalmascan dancing girls are especially distracting, a few of them in little more than the passing mention of dresses, to the interest of much of the rest of the room. Obviously there was some uncertainty of what might please or cause offense, and so though one of the various ice sculptures - kept from melting by ice Magicite at the base, which is also cooling the food on the table, a few men and women standing close to catch the chill - bears a slight resemblance to the Solidor crest, it would be easy enough to deny the likeness should he disapprove.

No aspics. Did he mention that? Not a single one. It's been six months since the fancy took hold yet _again_ in the capital and every noble with two coins to rub together seems obsessed with suspending anything and everything they can in towers of absurdly-colored inedibility. Vayne would congratulate Miguelo if it likely wouldn't send him into screaming fits. If anything, the bangaa's more nervous than he had been at their first meeting, hovering at the edges of the party and practically flinching from even his simple nod of recognition. It's what Vayne does to people, the way it's been for many, many years now, too dangerous for what he is and the near-absolute power that he can wield over them for any play at a casual acquaintance. It is kindness only to turn his attention elsewhere, and easy enough to do so, certainly enough demands on his time tonight.

He meets several of the city's civil leaders, each offering varying degrees of politeness from nervously friendly to simply uncomfortable to ice cold. These final few are mostly waved away, apologized for by their more solicitous companions. Eventually, he starts to shake hands with men whose titles aren't quite specific enough to define their services, and this is when he stops being Vayne Solidor, not even really Archadian anymore, simply a pile of gil in a nice coat, jingling loudly enough for all to hear.

What he's dealing with are not the truly powerful - anyone with the money to leave would have been prudent enough to do so before they'd taken Nabradia. These are their frontmen, the rich Dalmascans gone to Bhujerba or Rozarria who are testing the waters now, come to see what business can be done after two years of heavily-sanctioned uncertainty. If there is true purpose in investing once more in Rabanastre or if it is simply a buffer zone, fated as ground zero for the war to come.

It's the ship dealers, the parts traders, anyone connected to the trade who are by far the most ready to accept him. Archades is the forerunner of nearly all new airship technology - everyone uses it, everyone wants it - and if Vayne's a representative from Empire that has caused them so much grief, he is also the one who can open the markets back up, and get trade flowing properly again, if not better than before. The thought of being able to pick up Archadian parts and equipment on demand, of how far the supply lines go throughout the Empire, for import and export, is obviously more of a draw to these people than which flag they paint on the back of a ship when it's finished.

He needs to bring Cid up, along with some of his little disciples and whatever lunatic side-project the lab has been tinkering on. Always an obsession with more, better, faster. Currently, from what he's heard, they've gotten hooked on the idea of an airship that can break the sound barrier - some new way of using Nethicite to boost the engine capacity - and Vayne's seen the test ship, sleek and narrow and covered with some sort of synthetic skin that is insanely expensive to produce but greatly improves the aerodynamics. Even it's still only two-thirds as fast as they believe they can make it, it _looks_ impressive, and much of the time that is enough to consider it a success. If it is not yet useful, at least it might cause a stir here, at the least show up Rozarria, and _that_ has always been a worthy enterprise.

"Lord Consul? Your Grace?"

A lull in the crowd, and Captain Loren appears, drawing someone through the assembly to his side - and all at once Vayne understands exactly where his nervousness comes from, the source of his anger with the Judge and why it all seemed so oddly personal.

"Milord, if I may, I would introduce you to Risa. My wife, and a lady of Rabanastre."

Sympathetic to Dalmasca, indeed. Between the infant in her arms and the fullness of her belly beneath what must be the most formal of Dalmascan style, it seems Loren has taken it upon himself to be quite… invested in establishing friendly relations.

Vayne hides any amusement, certain it would be taken the wrong way, and accepts the careful curtsey she gives him with a slight bow of his own. The woman wears a complicated sort of multi-layered dress, each fabric with a wildly different color and pattern, and yet the overall look is quite elegant. Long, blonde hair carefully braided up - most in the city seem to be fair-haired and tan - and she gives him the same wary smile he has seen so often this night: studying him, as if she might determine his true motives. Little different than those back in Archades, but the urgency here is far more apparent, and understandable. All of Rabanastre is desperately searching for reassurance that he is indeed telling the truth, that there will be real peace - or if he is lying, just how bad it is going to get. A soft, youthful burble breaks the silence.

"… and who might this be?"

To the continuing disbelief and irritation of many in the court, Vayne is actually quite good with children - they like him, against every common belief of their being good judges of character. The infant has already started reaching for him, no doubt entranced by the various metal ornaments on his dress uniform, and with what might be the slightest hesitation, Risa hands him over.

"My son, Lord Consul. Sayel Elas Rhedan."

Fair-haired like his mother, but with Archadian eyes, steel-blue, and what looks like an Imperial nose to match. By marrying her, Loren has all but detonated any chances of ever going home again, and if she does not know this he most certainly does. The child might be his lawful heir, but it is highly doubtful he would ever be recognized in Archades' court. As if that is any sort of real loss, and the fools who consider themselves in charge of such things don't spend all their time pettily changing the rules to spite each other, each one of them certain that they are the purest, most valued House in the Empire.

He smiles, as the bright-eyed child immediately tugs on his epaulets - he's never figured out what else the damned things are good for - and Vayne knows everyone is watching, that even Lady Rhedan is a bit baffled by his interest. All of this, the child and the wife, a tangible reminder of his responsibility, and he can't help but feel it. What faith this is from them, that things will work out somehow. How brave, to choose to love, to start a family in such times. Vayne is making a promise to her, to them both - no less than two decades' steady peace, to raise their children in.

What are the odds, there is any hope of it? What dare he call himself if he fails? It is far too satisfying, to be arrogant and proud and above all _successful _in it, a thorn in the side of the Senate, to think of failure now.

"May he be the first of many proud sons of Dalmasca, and of the Empire." He says, handing the child carefully back to the Lady Rhedan. Yet again, a movement in the crowd from the corner of his eye, and as he continues through the room Vayne works to keep a careful distance between himself and the captain's family, just in case.

* * *

The fete continues on, perhaps a little rowdier as more of the famous - perhaps soon to be infamous - Dalmascan mulled wine is poured. Vayne shakes more hands, meets more businessmen, and their representatives. He's offered his pick of nubile Dalmascan women at least five times, and his pick of nubile Dalmascan men twice. The less it seems that he wants Rabanastre simply as the tactical high ground, the more important it is for them to find out what he _does_ want, and how they might curry his favor. The realm of business is shamelessly amoral, even more so than the court. Business doesn't care who holds a throne or how they might have come by it, it cares only for coin.

Vayne finds himself drawn, somewhat unexpectedly, into a discussion of chocobo breeding, and which licenses he might see fit to approve once he is in office. He questions the viability of one potential breed - all Larsa's doing that he even is aware of the issue - an aside on how certain pairings leave the birds enormously fast but prone to devastating leg fractures - and the man looks at him in surprise.

"You take an interest then, sir?"

"My brother is quite fond of racing. I would speak with you later, about a better look at your birds. I have heard that Dalmasca has its own rarer breeds, and I may wish to send him a gift."

"Of course, your Grace. I thank you."

Vayne turns away, listening once more to the crowd, the murmur of voices - hears a soft aside in what might be that particular clipped tone that signifies Bhujerba. Glances up, though he doubts he'll see anything. Many from the floating islands have strange, pale eyes - it has to do with the magicite, living so close from birth to such concentrated amounts. Of course, they won't be here for anything too dangerous, merely acting as informants or reconnaissance, intending only to watch, and perhaps that is all he has noticed tonight.

If it _is_ more - well, it would not be so far past his father to set something up, easy enough to blame it on the Resistance. If not that - gods, but they could not be so foolish, truly. Sheer insanity, to kill him here, and on the first day of his arrival? It would transform him from continuing nuisance to patriotic martyr overnight, and give Archadia all the justification they required, to bomb half of Dalmasca to glass. Or perhaps he would be a hostage? The poor bastards, to think he is worth more alive than dead. One would assume the Marquis would have been a bit more explicit when it came to Archadian politics - Ondore ought not to be that stupid, to know where things currently stand in the court.

He slowly retreats toward a corner of the hall, a little more sparsely occupied, where he can stand and observe with a bit more clarity and breathing space. The orange pom-pom bobbing at just below elbow height proves he's not the first with this idea. The moogle is nibbling on one of the small tarts from the nearest low table - Vayne's glad to see someone thought to provide for such things - though a good number of the creatures he's seen travel with folding platforms just for these kinds of occasions, lifting themselves at least a little closer to a hume's height.

"Good evening, sir." Vayne says, when the moogle has finished eating. "I don't believe we've been introduced. I hope you are enjoying the fete."

Moogles really don't care how they are seen by others, as far as he can tell. Vayne's always had the feeling that as much as humes consider the furry creatures cute and helpful, a useful resource, the moogles think of them much the same way. Tall and loud and a bit dim - perhaps the blood can't get all the way to their brains - but handy enough in certain situations, easy enough to work around the rest of the time. It isn't quite arrogance, and their naturally cheerful, optimistic dispositions - at least all those he's met - could certainly cover for far worse.

The moogle looks up, and blinks, not particularly bothered - Vayne has yet to meet one who's ever actually been intimidated by him. Cid's moogles have long since grown accustomed to him as just another piece of lab equipment, if he dares show up during production hours.

"Kupo! You're the new Lord Consul."

"Indeed. You are… with the skyship guilds?" Not much to them at the moment, though Imperial involvement will soon change that. Transform Rabanastre into a hub for transport and military strength that will hopefully give Rozarria second thoughts about pressing forward.

The moogle makes a dismissive sound, ears folding back slightly. "My name is Montblanc. I am the humble leader of Clan Centurio."

"Ah. I see."

The moogle can tell from his tone that something's off, Vayne sees his eyes narrow. "Do you have clans such as ours in Archades?"

"We have our share." Staggeringly corrupt, more often than not, operating as little better than gangs of mercenaries. Cheaper than other solutions to a myriad of daily woes, though prone to cause as many problems as they solve, and given the often loose connections between the clans and their… associates, it can be devilishly difficult to prosecute or even _locate_ the offenders. "I fear we find our own to be a bit… inclined to lawlessness."

A louder snort, this one definitely annoyed. "Clan Centurio keeps excellent records, kupo-po! We never closed, not once in these last two years. We have every hunt on file, complete or not - your soldiers have come to look at our records themselves. No tricks, no back-door deals - we keep track of our own."

The moogle makes a gesture toward a pair of Viera watching the dancers, and Vayne guesses it's the one in armor that gets sent out to deal with anyone caught doing what they ought not. He's tried to keep his distance from those of the women that he's seen so far in the city, can't afford a single rumor about the Lord Consul's health or well-being.

Two men are speaking to each other, near where the Viera stand. It seems incidental, as if he one simply tripped, walking by, and was making his apologies. One of them a soldier, one not, and so of course, neither of them are soldiers. At least not Archadian. So, it begins in earnest.

"Krjn won't look kindly on those who tarnish our reputation, and she lets them know it."

It's a little bit difficult to take Moogles seriously when they're trying to be intimidating, though Vayne has had some experience seeing what happens to those who try to boss around the shorter, furrier members of the Draklor labs, usually involving catastrophic engine failure at opportune moments. Or their version of a practical joke - a crew of moogles with simple tools can take down a small craft like a pack of piranhas, reducing it to the struts in the time it takes a hapless Judge, say, to take a tour through the lab and return to where his transport used to be. Vayne would feel worse about taking Montblanc lightly, if he didn't know the moogle was likely quite happy to use it to his advantage, when it served. Never cuter and less assuming, than when they were ducking blame or cleaning up at card games. The perfect faces for bluffing - Cid swore they never actually blinked.

"You are the only clan in Rabanastre, than?"

"First, only and best, kupo!" The moogle's eyes are bright with pride. "You said there are many clans in Archades?"

"Quite a few, yes." More than Vayne can count, and half of those illegal but profitable enough to be known, to pay the right bribes to continue in their business. The matter of Old Archades complicates things immeasurably.

Two more figures on the other side of the room, a man and a woman, just slightly too cautious with their movements. Not Bhujerbian or Rozarrian, he's almost sure of it. Slowly but surely, there's a perimeter forming around the room, just enough to be seen. Vayne's guessing they don't know about the extra soldiers laying in wait outside - he's only paranoid because he's rarely wrong - and even without them, he doubts they have the numbers to pull off the direct assault they actually seem to be attempting.

"Kupo! Too big. It's better here. I know everyone. Desert traders. Builders. Everyone."

He's not lying. It isn't Archades, where trying to find the man in charge of repairing walls in one of the middle sectors takes five letters to three guilds and interminable visits from 'consultants' who seem to get paid by how much time they can waste. Gods help them all when a bridge goes out.

Vayne's already met with the bridge builder here, and his brother, who handles construction on the western half of the city, and his sister and his cousin, in charge of things in the sands directly surrounding Rabanastre. Already a long discussion of what needs to be repaired and where and the cost. It took three minutes to find the man who handled flood precautions, two more to find the Guild head for the stonemasons and if he hadn't had to get ready for the fete Vayne could have had the next six months worth of building projects lined up in little less than two hours.

It was a mistake, for the Senate and his father ever to send him here. It will be deeply rewarding, to see them realize just how badly they've erred.

Vayne steps away from the wall, as he finally chooses his target - a hunt of his very own, though he doubts there will be much in the way of reward.

"It has been a pleasure, Montblanc. I hope we may see more of each other in the future."

"Come on by, kupo! I'll give you a discount!"

* * *

The tall man with the dark hair is in an Imperial coat, two seasons out of style, not quite long enough at the sleeves. He'd probably chosen it at random, in an attempt to blend in, unaware just how far it sets him apart. How can Vayne be so sure it signifies? No reason, no logic. Just a suspicion, the little push of intuition that's seen him through all the other close calls that make up his life, and if he lets this happen now, if he lets them control it - no. Oh no, that will not do. If they're going to hesitate in striking at him, the least he can do is present them with a better opportunity.

Deep down, Vayne knows it is far less than pragmatism that ever sent him on his adventures through dark alleys, forever chasing danger. Not at all a matter of logic or calculation or gain. It is simply spite and pride, a childish rebellion - to take any regard for his own life and fling it back in his father's face, to show how little he cares. Let the old man die afraid, clinging to his crown and his power, and let him do it alone.

_Ah yes. Get your throat slit by rabid nationalists. That will show him._

It is Cid's voice, in the back of his mind, the scolding parent he never expected to have, that he is both idiot and lunatic and he cannot die here, that his sword arm has not been tested against any real opponent since the insanity at Nabudis and wasn't _that_ close enough for him?

No, apparently not. His blood is singing with the promise of what is likely to come, heart pounding and it makes his entire side throb, pricks of cold where the Midlight Shard is slowly draining him dry.

It makes some sense, that if he surprises them, if he can keep their attention on him then the rest of the room has a better chance of escaping unscathed. Vayne wonders how many rebels there are - perhaps some of the guards at the corners of the room, or the servants. Not a single one among them is fast enough to anticipate him, though, as he steps forward and drops a friendly hand tight onto the shoulder of a man who goes instantly rigid and still.

"Ah, I thought it was you. It has been far too long!"

Difficult not to laugh at the look of shock on the man's face, round-eyed and pale, and Vayne draws him into a cheerful, rough embrace, the better to get a fast look over his shoulder, glancing around the room. At least three of the 'guard' are shifting nervously - and one of them glances at a person Vayne can't immediately pick out, among the servants near the long table - and then he draws back, clapping the man on the shoulder again.

"How are you, then? Your family is well?"

"I… yes, Lord Consul. Quite well. It has… been some time, I am surprised that you remember me. Congratulations on your… arrival."

Bless him for trying to play along. Unlikely he has been much trained in the art of assassination, surely not on how to act should his target suddenly decide to be his best friend. Vayne fights not to look into the crowd again, not to give too much away - surely they must be all in a panic now, wondering what they ought do, if they have truly been found out. The hesitation speaks volumes of their experience in this sort of thing - it's rather touching, really, such an earnest, fumbling affair, this attempt on his life just as charming and unsophisticated as the rest of the night has been.

Vayne half-drags the man away from the crowd, still chatting politely, to where he thought the 'guard' might have glanced - toward the leader of this little insurrection. He resists the urge to force the man into any excessive improvisation, though the temptation to ask after pets or great-aunts or tragic love affairs is quite strong, just to see how far he's willing to go to keep up his cover.

This is his enemy, as it stands - the royal insurgence, those men still loyal to King Raminas and the Princess, who is, by all accounts, remarkably inspirational for being two years in her grave. Of course she's not here tonight, much too valuable for them to risk on this. Almost surely in Dalmasca, though - certainly alive, and he might very well catch a close ally or two tonight, men she would prefer to negotiate for rather than abandon to their fate.

Still, it is time to shut the trap, and Vayne cannot help himself. Every man who fancies himself a leader, nothing more than an actor in constant search of an audience.

"So, you must tell me, now… how did the Lady Ashelia enjoy the speech?"

He speaks into a lull, and his voice carries quite far. A few confused looks, from the nearest edge of the crowd - but the silence lingers with heavy portent, a breath, two - and his long-lost 'friend' is staring at him in what is quickly becoming fear. A moment later, and Vayne shoves him back, hard, so that the blade that is aimed to end the Lord Consul where he stands is thrust instead into empty air.

A glimpse of short, light brown hair beneath the costume of a servant's cap, a plain shirt and trousers, and from a distance it would simply be a youth, a young boy - but no boy would carry such a fine weapon, or look at him with eyes so full of hate, and Vayne knows her even before the foolish cry comes from elsewhere in the room - "Milady, no!"

_I do not think the lady cares to listen…_

Ashelia, Crown Princess and sole heir to the Dalmascan throne brings the sword around fast for a second try at cutting him in half, but Vayne's swiftly drawn his own blade to block and the room snaps to instant chaos as if a switch has been thrown. The false guards and servants are quickly drawing weapons of their own, clashing with the Archadian guard as others shout or scream or run for cover. It is clear the princess sees none of it, not even that she has put herself at a disadvantage, the line of guards sweeping past where she now fights him, and Vayne throws a hand out as two of his own move to intervene.

"Keep your distance!" He barks. The last thing he needs is to have an overzealous idiot run a sword through her, and there's no need to let her tear into anyone else by accident. If this is a duel she believes she is owed, it would be dishonorable not to oblige her.

The war cry does her credit, lunging once more to put the sword through his heart. It is not a demand for the freedom of the glorious people of Dalmasaca. It is not a protest against the invasive and repressive polices of the Empire. It is simple rage and pain and fury, nothing more, and she strikes at him with all that she has, every deflected lunge, every blow that clashes off his blade meant only to kill.

Vayne can imagine her alone, these last two years, pouring all her grief and anger into this fight. Training and studying without pause, getting stronger over the long days and nights she ought to have spent with her husband, or with the first of their children in some other world, some halcyon not-to-be. All of it, all that effort for this moment - why does she think killing him will change anything? - and yet, still little more than a child herself, with her virtuous anger and her shining sword. What does she imagine this will accomplish, even if she should win?

He has trained with the blade from the age of eight, kept up with it all this time in the deluded hope that it might actually solve any of his problems. The Lady Ashelia doesn't realize or doesn't care that he is _allowing_ her to drive him further back across the floor, out of the reach of her allies even as they shout that she must withdraw, they must regroup. Her men are competent enough but already starting to flag, and Vayne has nothing if not more soldiers and this is not her world, even if she wishes it to be. She was not born for strategy and sacrifice and cold calculations - and her husband, Vayne thinks, was very cruel to leave her to face this alone. Unkind and unfair, that she is expected to stand against the Empire and mend what has been torn asunder, as if such a task makes any sense at all outside of fairy tales.

It is simple enough, to wait until her strength wavers, until she lunges one final time too many. Much too slow, painfully easy to drive the princess back with a series of fast strikes, her competent defense falling apart as he brings several more years of practice and strength to bear behind his blade. Vayne sees her eyes widen in surprise, sees the frustration there but by that point he's already landed the final blow, sharply slapping the sword out of her hand. It skitters away, and she is left panting and statue still, the point of his sword hovering over the hollow of her throat. Distantly, someone shouts in panic, probably trying to reach her side, already aware it's too late. It is exactly equal, the fear in Ashelia's eyes and the challenge, almost daring him to finish it. Afraid and hating him and so fiercely wanting to die for honor.

It ends up mattering little what either of them want, as Ghis chooses that exact moment to fire a full round from the Ifrit's main cannons directly down into the courtyard just outside the palace, shattering every window in the room and scattering guards and guests and insurgents in a dozen directions at once.

Vayne falls right as Ashelia drops left, which would mean little except that he lands with full force on his injured arm and the whole world goes gray with the pain of it. He's learned to compensate for the constant, aching cold, the sensitivity in his shoulder, but now the Midlight Shard is like a taloned fist scissoring into his skin. Simple luck only, that he manages to fall with his sword flat beneath him instead of being skewered. He grits his teeth, forcing the world back into clarity, pushing himself up even before his vision fully clears. It's not fast enough, one of the rebels half-dragging the princess to her feet, and they are all but out of the room before Vayne has regained his feet.

He dispatches the man attempting to hold guard on the door with a deft swipe of his sword, hears a shout from his own guard trying to reach his side, but the princess will know these halls better than he does and Vayne may have already lost them, and that makes up his mind for him: he gives chase. It's clear now, at least, that she doesn't know where the Dusk Shard is, or surely she would have already made him _eat_ it. Strange, that she hadn't yet made the journey to Raithwall's tomb, unless the Dawn Shard wasn't there either - and he wonders again about her father, if Raminas really had confided _nothing_ in the Dynast-King's final heir.

The palace is in chaos, he passes wounded guards and the bodies of rebels, hearing clashing swords and shouting down the side halls, with wide-eyed servants cowering in corners or peeking out from barely-opened doors. It seems they are being hit by the Resistance on all sides, and Vayne can see flickers of orange rising up from one of the courtyards - it had better not be the gardens on fire. What in hell is Ghis _thinking_, firing down from above, hardly the sort of attack that will distinguish between friend and foe.

_He's thinking of the promotion he'll get, if they should dig your body out of the rubble._

Promotion nothing, more likely how he would look on the throne.

Vayne had the survey done of the palace before they'd arrived, looking for secret entrances and hidden passages, though it's quite clear now they hadn't found them all. Still no sign of the princess, though Vayne turns the corner to find a few of his soldiers at the end of a frantic fight. Two rebels already down and one fleeing, and then they are all toppled once again by an earth-shattering roar. This time the cannon fire manages to collapse half the outer wall, stone, metal and glass sent flying. One of the soldiers is tossed back against the stones, arm pressed against his gut with a muffled scream, a piece of steel like a crossbow bolt easily puncturing through his armor, pinning him to the inner wall. An ally is up almost instantly, hand already glowing green as he reaches down to pull it free and heal. The third soldier staggers to his feet alongside Vayne, the both of them watching the remaining rebel drag himself out of the rubble and stumble back into a run.

Vayne grabs the soldier at the collar of his breastplate, resisting the urge to shake him hard. "Find a radio and tell Judge Ghis to _stop_ _helping_!"

He is moving before the man has a chance to reply, scrambling over the wreckage, and rounds the corner just in time to see the rebel disappear into an alcove, down yet another damned hidden stair. No doubt he is meant to meet up with the princess below, along with what remains of the insurgence, and all Vayne needs do is follow at a distance and with this many hidden doors why did they not just wait until the middle of the night and kill him in his sleep?

It is unforgivably stupid to charge in blindly, to think the man doesn't realize he's being followed, that maybe he even realizes it's the Lord Consul behind him. Momentum carries him down the first two stairs before Vayne realizes the rebel is at the bottom looking up at him, one hand already raised. Maybe half a heartbeat to think that Cid was right about flinging himself so foolishly into certain peril, and then the rebel has cast the spell - a Flare, and there's that a horrible instant Vayne knows quite well enough, the way it seems to contract the very air right in front of his eyes, blazing like a newborn star, and this is going to be_ deeply unpleasant_-

Vayne hasn't been able to cast properly since Nabudis. Not exactly a surprise, though he'd kept trying a bit more than he knew was sensible, even the slightest attempt at drawing up any energy leaving him sweating and shaking, his arm screaming - rather a lot like it is now, more power than he can possibly absorb scorching through his veins, ice-cold lightning. It's surely going to tear him apart, but the Nethicite in his system isn't really interested in his limitations, absorbing the Flare in an instant, so much power surging through him so fast Vayne only rocks slightly back on his heels as it fades, his body not quite able to process the damage as quickly as it has been done.

The rebel stares at him in what quickly turns to blank terror, his easy victory snatched by an utter impossibility - Vayne Solidor's gone and made himself immune to magic.

"I bet you can't tell me why that didn't work." Vayne smirks, and he's infinitely lucky that it's enough to make the man panic and run, that he is alone in the enclave and there's no one else to see as the backlash finally hits him in full, and he slides down the wall, onto his knees, leaning back against the top step, looking up to a sky he can't see as he feels his heart stop.

Well, then.

A long, quiet moment, just Vayne on the dim stairs with the silence in his chest and some thought about the measurement of eternity, gone before he's finished thinking it - and he chokes on his next breath, feels his heart shudder its way back into something like a steady beat as he breathes in and out and in.

"So," He murmurs, just to prove he is still alive, "… that is how it is."

It will be better if Cid doesn't find out about this.

* * *

"What we ought to do, you see, is make a deal. The princess gives herself up, or we toss one of her precious citizens off an airship every hour or so. I tell you, we'd have her before midday, one way or another."

"Or I could offer them my head _now _and save you even more time." Vayne snaps, coming around the corner, and Telkiris is instantly at attention, already a bit of contrition in his voice. Not nearly enough, but he will learn.

"Lord Consul, you are unharmed? We sent men to look for you, but-"

"I found another passage below, but I was only chasing shadows. Have we managed to secure the palace?"

It's clear they have. Vayne can see a makeshift infirmary in what was once the left side of the ballroom. Bits and pieces of the now shattered sculptures have been employed for bumps and bruises, flickers of green magic being used to attend to the more severe injuries.

"Yes, milord. We have captured a few of the rebels - they are being transported to the Ifrit under Judge Ghis' orders. He has suggested we assemble some men to go into the city and-"

"No."

"But milord-" Vayne is still moving, and his disagreement startles the Judge enough that Telkiris has to step quickly to catch up with him. "We must act decisively, so that these insurgents-"

"The rebellion has been fully routed, and there are men combing the waterways even now to track down its leaders. Sending more troops into the streets will only cause further panic and endanger both our soldiers and innocent civilians."

"Lord Consul, if we do not act, we may not be able to maintain control of the city."

Vayne pauses, glancing back.

"Interesting, Judge Telkiris. I was under the impression we already _had_ absolute control of Rabanastre. It seems these people have more fire in them than you thought."

The princess, certainly. The look in her eyes - if she should take control of even a single Shard, let alone the Sun-Cryst itself…

"Well, my lord. That is…"

Vayne turns away from the Judge, only to pause, staring into a small room offset from the main hall. It is crowded, obviously every Dalmascan the guard could get their hands on within. Not rebels, at least not all of them, but certainly everyone who is suspiciously blonde. He sees no sign of the bangaa, fortunately - but there is the Lady Rhedan, an arm against her chest and another splayed over the curve of her stomach, staring blankly into a middle distance. At least someone had the decency to find her a chair. Several dozen pair of eyes look up at him, all at once, frightened and confused, and it isn't exactly anger Vayne feels - this is not all that unexpected, really - so perhaps it is the lingering ache in his chest and arm that has frayed his temper so.

"Release them. It is late, let them return to their homes."

Amazing, how well a faceless suit of armor can radiate utter disbelief.

"Your Excellency, certainly we ought to question-"

"Release them _immediately_," Vayne turns to face the Judge, raising his voice to carry across the hall, "and let your soldiers know that if I hear of any acts of transgression, or attempts at retribution following this night, those responsible will be tried by the citizens of Rabanastre, and I will not hesitate to mete out their chosen punishment. If any man is foolish enough to risk the city's peace on some misguided attempt at revenge, I am heartless enough to wash my hands of him."

A grossly unpopular decision that will not at all endear him to the soldiers, but Vayne is not about to let anyone, not even the Dynast-King's heir, redraw the terms of this engagement now and force him into a fight. Gods, if the girl even realizes the weight of her decisions, if this is not simply her desire to return to some simpler time that had ever only been the calm before the storm.

He can understand where she's coming from, and Ashelia surely has every right to both anger and vengeance. It won't stop him from crushing her, if it comes to it.

"Sir, I don't think…"

Vayne looks at him, long used to staring down far more dangerous people, and all that plate armor might as well be made of paper, any title he has worth even less than that. The problem with being polite - at times you have to repeat yourself. Still, it seems that Telkiris has started to realize the extent of the trouble he is in.

"Y-yes sir, of course. Right away."

Vayne ignores the orders shouted to the guards, and the Dalmascans who warily begin to file out of the room, giving him a wide berth as he steps inside. Lady Rhedan has not moved, even with the crowd stirring around her, and there is a murmur of surprise that rustles through them, as he takes a knee, so that he might catch her downcast gaze. It is calculated humility, to gain the sympathy of these citizens of Rabanastre, who are trying to pretend they're not watching. It is honest chivalry, to be concerned for a woman with child, who is tense and frightened and, for a moment, looks right through him.

"My lady, are you well?"

Recognition sparks panic, one hand over her mouth badly stifling a gasp, and Vayne has her hand in his as she quickly rises, the other on her shoulder to steady her. He does not know where the captain is, and feels a momentary cold twist, that she is indeed completely alone.

"Are you all right? Where is your son?"

"Lord Consul, I…" One hand against her chest, nervous fingers dancing over her heart. "He went away with the nursemaid, before all of this… I-I had meant to join them, but…"

Afraid of him. So very afraid.

"It would be better, I think, to send you home with a private guard tonight. I believe you will be quite safe, but there is nothing wrong with taking precautions - you have seen your husband?"

She goes pale. "Lord Consul, I… please, my lord, do not look upon him - upon the people of this city, that we… I… we would never, this is not…"

She trails off helplessly, and he wonders what she'd planned to say. It is good, being able to give her a reassuring smile. At least one thing this night he can put to rights. "Please, do not make yourself uneasy, lady. I did not come here expecting harmony in a single day. It will take a good deal of time to build any real trust here, and my pride will surely survive a whipping with the olive branch."

It is not much of a joke, but he can feel her relax, realizing he is not about to bring this all down on her simply because he can. He can only imagine what horrible fates she'd thought up for herself, for her husband and Rabanastre. It is not as if Vayne doesn't know exactly what he is capable of, but to wield such ruthlessness like a moody, spoiled child, to be thoughtlessly cruel to those who have no recourse, who cannot fight back - well, there is room in even great Archades for only one Judge Magister Bergan, and his position has thankfully been filled.

If he can go through his life without ever rating that comparison, Vayne believes he will die contented.

"My husband… he went down below with the guard, searching for more rebels."

Rebels. His word or hers? It is of little consequence, though if there are more women like her in Rabanastre, the princess may have a more difficult time than she thought convincing them to abandon what has been rebuilt, rejecting their new homes and families for some vague grasp at restoring sovereignty. Is Ashelia working with Rozarria, perhaps? What marvelous lies do they have her believing?

If she finds either Shard, Archades will be burying thousands in its streets, that is all but certain. _Thousands? Remember Nabudis._ Millions. Millions of his people dead, if Rozarria helps her to aim the blow.

"I will let him know I have seen you safely home, my lady, and restore him to you as soon as I am able."

He offers an arm, and she is leaning against him with more than mere politeness as they move to the door, shaken and weary. The rest of the Dalmascans have made the best of his offer, and they are mostly alone. It is easy, then, to hear the familiar, heavy tread, the clank and shift of iron plates long before Gabranth turns the corner.

Judge Magisters always sound different, though there is not that much more weight to their armor. A shift in gravity along with the title, perhaps, until it is as if, on a whim, they might crack the very world beneath their step. Lady Rhedan's grip tightens on his arm, leaning into him, away from Gabranth, though she still manages a smile, a polite curtsey as he passes her over to a waiting guard. One of his own men, not Telkiris', and Vayne does not have to say a word to know she will be well taken care of.

"I… thank you, Lord Consul. I am very grateful to you… more than I have words for."

He waits until she is gone, and they are alone, and moves back into the now-empty room with Gabranth a step behind. The other difference between Magisters and the rest, that when he wants to be the man is alarmingly quiet, nearly all trace of the strength and power he wields turned to silence.

Vayne had seen Gabranth once, near the start of his service, caught in a training session suddenly gone wrong; and he'd watched as they'd had to pry the Judge out of his owns smoldering armor. Long hooks set into the warped edge of the mangled chest plate, and the surgeon finally had to put his foot against Gabranth's side and strain for all he was worth. After a few tortured moments, the plate had given way with a horrible, wet sound, the screech of twisting metal and a few shocked gasps from onlookers. Nothing from Gabranth, though. He hadn't moved, enduring both injury and aftermath without so much as a groan. The man is a titan. If it ever came to blows between them, Vayne has few illusions for his own survival, thinks he might be able to keep himself alive for at least a few minutes, but even that only if he sees it coming.

Always a risk, to trust, and those he allows anywhere near Larsa - well, Drace's approval had been the real measure of Gabranth, though Vayne knew she would never believe he set anything by her opinion. Still, if Ghis made any gesture toward him, could ever manage to convince Gabranth to shift allegiances, even for a moment…

"You know she may very well be one of them."

He sounds the very Word of God with the helmet on. Judge Magisters are loathe to remove them, even in private conversations. Considering where they are, Vayne is not entirely sure how Gabranth manages his meals, or sleeps.

"A rebel? Yes, and the unborn child as well, no doubt." He says dryly. "I suppose she will relate any particulars of the spectacular failure that they might have overlooked. Or how I have had merchant Guilds in Archades make better attempts on my life."

No real reason he has to be so confrontational - fair enough, _obnoxious_ - with the man. Some of it is likely inherited with his position as Drace's semi-official protege - or that Gabranth is quite obviously the leash on him here. Watching him, practically from the moment he became Judge Magister, and no doubt faithfully reporting on his every word and action to the Emperor. Vayne wonders if his father's truly so far gone, that he actually thinks he's being subtle.

"You ought be more careful, Lord Vayne. You are not among friends."

Is it possible, to overdose on irony? Maybe he's simply developed an immunity.

"Do pay my respects to your brother when you see him."

A feint of what was ever only minor value there, and if the princess has truly returned to the fight, this first visit may be the last time they will meet, the former captain at the end of his limited usefulness. It seems only fair to allow Gabranth to decide his brother's fate, though Vayne can imagine what the resolution will likely be. Two years shackled deep underground and it still is not enough, any mention of him an easy way to kill a conversation dead.

"I would greatly appreciate it, Gabranth, if you found the Lady Ashelia before Ghis does."

Vayne does not know what her true value might yet be, but nothing good can come of her leaving Rabanastre. The Judges answer only to his father, and anything can happen on an airship between here and Archades that even an Emperor cannot control.

* * *

At nineteen, Loren had fallen in love. It had not seemed such a scandalous thing then, the girl from a House not much different than his own, and his position as third son not so unthinkable for such an alliance - but her father had ambitions for her future that were far more than anything he might provide. He'd been blind and foolish and what should have been their elopement night saw Loren beaten twice for his insolence, first by her brother and then by his own. He had shamed his House, the girl had quickly married another, and for all his own heartbreak it seemed she found contentment in her new life, and had soon come to consider him a childish fancy, easily forgotten.

If only he had been able to do the same. Instead, Loren had lunged at the first, most distant offer he could find, and one his father was quite happy to release him to, to keep him from further damaging the family's reputation. He journeyed to Rabanastre, the furthest place in the Empire from Archades, to take up a thankless job with only an illusion of any real power where no one else wanted to go. He only hoped the news might yet reach his beloved, that he had died tragically, murdered by the enemies of Archadia while trying to forget her. Or he would simply turn bachelor, and live out the remainder of his days wise and bitter, knowing better than to believe in love.

It lasted three months, if that. Then he'd met Risa, and the first time he had smiled and the second was a joke he couldn't remember and _she_ had smiled, and the third was an absurdly passionate kiss, as much her desire as his own, though he hardly dared to believe it. Each of them had quickly agreed it was a terrible idea and this was no time for such things, and she had feared for what his family would do, and he had not wanted her to be shunned for associating with an Archadian. They'd worried, worried, worried all through more meetings and more kisses and secret nighttime trysts. Endless promises from both of them that it must end, that it would have to stop, vows no sooner made than broken, and he'd wanted to marry her then, all that time, even before she'd come to him with the first news of their son.

Loren had sent the proper missives home, announcing his new wife, and then his child, unsurprised when there was no reply to either. He wouldn't have left anyway, nothing in Archades to go back for. Even before he'd given his heart to Risa, it had belonged to the desert, to Dalmasca. A good, slow season then, nearly two years of his life that had been sweet to him, even as they meant such hardship for so many in Rabanastre. Loren had quietly counted his blessings, a little ashamed to do so when the city suffered, and he'd tried to help where he was able. A few had turned their backs on Risa for being his wife, but Loren had found he could be stubborn when it counted, and he'd done what he could to prove his worth to to the rest of them - his people, whatever they might think of him. Did his best to minimize the damage when there was no argument he could make that the Judges - the real power in Rabanastre as it had been at home - cared to listen to.

All that is surely over with, even his minor victories crumbling before his eyes. All his plans, his reassurances to the Lord Consul - to _Vayne Solidor_, of all the people in the world to have to come _here_ - that Rabanastre was peaceful, ready to move past what had been, that they would rise to his challenge and embrace a new, prosperous future -

He can be executed for this, quite easily, as an embarrassment to the Lord Consul and to the Emperor himself. If a scapegoat is required, there are few better options and he is, politically speaking, of zero importance. It wasn't as if Telkiris hadn't questioned his loyalties often enough - and with tonight, there too goes any thought of ever getting rid of the bastard. The Judge likely has a hundred men out on the streets even now, meeting the new dawn by breaking down doors and cracking skulls as they see fit, pure retaliation. The Lord Consul will come down on all of them hard for this, House Solidor hardly known for its acts of mercy.

Loren slumps against the wall just outside of the ballroom, his fate, the fate of the city he has come to call home, seeming more and more bleak by the moment. It would be kinder, surely, if the sun never rose. The wounded have been tended to, the dead removed - a few soldiers, some civilians and rebels. He doesn't like to think it fortunate, that no one with a title had been harmed, no one from Archades, but there it is. No one lost that could make things worse, not that they aren't plenty bad enough.

_The Princess Ashelia, alive? … and _now_ of all times._ Was it too much to ask that she wait even a week? Had the Lord Consul's speech truly been_ that_ successful, to scare them into action before anyone might have second thoughts? As if any of it mattered now. He'd believed it all to be a feint at first, the speech no more than a token gesture of goodwill, easily tossed aside. Yet there had been that strange business in his office - _call me Vayne, if you like _- as if he'd _ever_ be that foolish. As if he hadn't been worried, just to introduce the Lord Consul to his wife. If Vayne Solidor had taken a liking to her…

No one here in Rabanastre, no Dalmascan understands just what Vayne Solidor _is_ and what it means, how watching the Lord Consul even deign to join the party seemed an impossibility. Walking around, shaking hands, as if he were anything like the rest of them, as if those in his position didn't prefer to keep their distance, admitting few to speak in their presence and entirely on their terms. It's about more than just fealty, some sense of obligation or patriotism - Vayne is heir to the Imperial throne and House Solidor sits at the head of the Thirty Names, all Houses that Loren can name easily, though he has never actually spoken with a member of a single one until today. It is their will that charts the course of the Empire, and all who live within it. Vayne is the first son of the most powerful of them all, which means he can do anything he wants, whenever he wants, to whomever he wants, and there will be no reprisal. No one would ever dare. If Loren were to disappear, right now, Risa would be silenced and his family would claim they'd never had a third son. It is as simple as that.

He is tired enough, lost in his own bleak, vaguely terrified thoughts, that when the wine bottle appears in front of his downcast gaze he reaches for it immediately, taking a long drink and thank the gods he finishes before realizing just who has passed it over. He snaps to attention so hard it makes him wobble on his feet, nearly cracking himself in the face with the bottle as he tries to salute. It's a miracle he isn't unconscious or soaked with wine by the end of it.

"Your Eminence… Lord Consul… I was just… I…"

Vayne Solidor leans against the wall, looking as fresh as composed as he had at the start of the evening, what seems like ages ago. As if he hasn't been up all night like the rest of them, as if there isn't anything on its way but more of the same, danger and trouble. He has a plate in one hand, full of little square pastries from what must have been the one remaining table that hadn't been torn apart by soldiers or covered in broken glass. It is the second time in so many hours that Loren's been reduced to stunned silence, just watching him eat.

"Would you like one? Some sort of… spinach inside, I think. They're quite good."

"Yes, my wife makes them sometimes. They taste better warm." He says blankly, as his body refuses to stay at attention a moment longer, leaving him slumped and unsteady, shaking off an adrenaline surge he didn't know he still had in him. What might be the slightest flicker of a smile, in the Lord Consul's eyes.

"I imagine they do."

It takes another few dumbfounded seconds to realize Vayne is gesturing for the wine, and at least he's got enough sense to wipe the top off with the cleanest part of his shirt, though the man seems not to care.

"Did you have any luck below?"

"N-no, sir. I fear there was… very little progress. The attempt on the palace was completely unsuccessful, but the ones who retreated - they know those catacombs far better than we do. Of course, if you should wish it, I would be happy to-" His bones protest even the thought of another trip down those stairs, into that maze of dark passages and unknown dangers, but better to have aching limbs than no limbs at all. Vayne cuts him off with a shake of his head.

"No, that won't be necessary. Let Judge Telkiris have the full weight of this, it will make him feel important. I have sent Judge Magister Gabranth down as well, he should have news soon enough."

Two? _Two_ Judge Magisters here in the city? Was it too late to just curl up and hide and hope to be forgotten?

"I took the liberty of having my guard escort your wife home. Forgive my imposition, but it seemed the most prudent measure."

It wasn't as if he'd forgotten about her. Of course Risa had been his priority, when the party had erupted into sudden, violent chaos. His first thought, that at least their son was already home, safe and out of danger. Loren had brought her swiftly to an inner room, no windows, where several other ladies had taken refuge, and made her promise not to open the door. He'd seen her afterward at a distance, when the rebels had scattered and the Ifrit had stopped blasting holes in the palace, but there had been no time to do more than reassure himself she was still all right - still alive - before he'd been needed below. It hits him only now, how she could have been… how the insurgents, or the airship cannons, and she the pregnant wife of an Archadian. The Lord Consul sending a guard to his home, because they would have considered her a_ traitor_…

His knees go weak, and Loren takes a few deep breaths, pressing a hand quite hard against the wall. If the Lord Consul notices, he pretends not to.

"If you would feel safer, you may move your family into the palace. I'm sure there are a few rooms Ghis didn't get a chance to destroy. You will need to move your offices here, regardless. I have the feeling I'll need you within arm's reach in the months ahead."

"I… yes, of course. I mean, the office, yes, not… thank you, Lord Consul, for your concern." Who knows, it might only take a few months before he'll actually get a full sentence out in front of the man, with all its pieces in the right order.

"It is nothing. I ought to have had you see her home well before things took such a turn."

Vayne seems so composed, absolutely unshaken, just as he had been at the fete and even when fighting the princess - how could it be her, how? He had been in control of that duel the entire time, just as he was now. 'Took a turn' indeed, as if an assassination attempt could be a simple inconvenience, even _entertaining_ and - and Loren realizes what has just been said, what it means.

"You... knew?"

The Lord Consul, wholly at ease. Of course, of course he knew.

"It is not the first time I have been welcomed with drawn swords, captain. I doubt it will be the last."

A good thing Loren is too tired to even begin to ask the questions that suddenly log jam inside his mind. Did he even know that the princess was alive? Was that truly her? Does he know what's going to happen now? How did he know about the attack, and why risk his life if he did?

"You should go home, captain, and look to your wife. We shall meet later. I see little reason to do anything of consequence at present."

Certainly time to go home, before he makes any more of a fool of himself. Loren tries to shake off the worst of his muddled weariness.

"Lord Consul, I know that this has been… not, perhaps, the most ideal of welcomes, but I still - I believe that these people…"

"My people." Vayne says simply, looking at him. "Our people."

Well, what else is there to say?

"Yes, sir."

A call for the Lord Consul somewhere in the distance. Vayne makes quick work of the remaining appetizers, sets the plate on an obliging pile of what had once been part of the ceiling.

"Please tell the bangaa, Miguelo, that I apologize for all the fuss, and when you return, you may bring the list of those you believe we should be retrieving from Nalbina. It will be an easier problem to solve if we can manage it soon, before all this chaos sorts itself out."

He's staring again. Loren has the feeling it will be a habit.

"Forgive me for saying so, milord, but… you are not… you are not what I thought you would be."

A strange little smile, the Lord Consul's gaze turned momentarily down and inward, and Loren instantly regrets being so forward, wishes he could take it back, but Vayne Solidor does nothing more, says nothing, only turns and walks away.

* * *

Rabanastre is very quiet. No one on the streets, even though it is nearly dawn and the merchants ought to be setting up, putting out the morning's wares. No one wants to be the first, to find out how the wind is blowing. Loren ought to go visit with those he knows, to let them know that all is - if not well - than not heralding immediate signs of the apocalypse, but he is so weary that anyone with ill intent would have him in moments, and he needs to see Risa, to hold her in his arms.

The Lord Consul's guards are at the front gate, giving only a slight nod as he steps through into his inner courtyard. If he were a more paranoid man he might wonder if Vayne was taking this, the earliest opportunity, to get a hold on him, to have him loyal and at the ready - but at the moment he'd much rather be seen as a useful pawn than be _dead_. He isn't two steps in the door before Risa is rushing forward, her arms around him, and he can do no more than stand where he is, press his face to her hair and breathe in the sweetness of her. Still wearing her dress from the party, and something about the careless wrinkles in the fabric, the sense of joy, discarded yet lingering, very nearly undoes him. It had been too close, much too close.

"I was so worried! I thought - but you're all right. You're all right?"

He had wondered if she might already be asleep. How foolish of him. Loren knows he ought to say something, but his voice flutters wearily in his chest, refusing to oblige him. Risa's dark eyes take him in, looking for injuries - she raises his hands in her own, brushes her lips against bruised knuckles.

"You're hurt."

"I'm fine. It's nothing. I'm fine." He'll be feeling it tomorrow - today, whenever - but at the moment there's only her. He slides a hand against her cheek, kisses her, leaning his forehead against hers for a moment, remembering how to breathe. "Are you-"

"I am well." A hand over his, where he's rested it against her stomach. "We're all well, now that you are home."

Loren can barely manage to move forward, hardly paying attention as Risa pulls him to the bedroom, their clothes quickly left in crumpled piles, abandoned on the floor as she tugs the heavy curtains over what's likely to be a glorious morning. He wonders if the Lord Consul has found anything, or if he too has made an end to his day. Does he even sleep? Nothing else about him is normal, why should that be any different? So weary, that Loren thinks he might fall asleep on his feet, and yet when he drops into bed, an arm around his wife and her own hand clinging tightly in return, his thoughts swirl and crash together and oblivion will not come.

"What did you think of him?" Risa says quietly into the silence, because what else is there to think about, really? He chuckles slightly, tired enough that it comes out too honest, far more grim than he'd intended.

"I have no idea. When I'd heard the news, that they were actually sending… I feared the worst." A nightmare. If _half _the rumors of him were true… "Now? I don't know. I just… I don't know."

Except that he's frightened to even think about facing Vayne Solidor again, and this is_ after_ the man chose not to burn half of Rabanastre down or execute him on the spot. He will have to go back, it is his duty, even if he doubts it will become any easier with repetition.

"He is… strange, isn't he?" Risa says. "Distant. I thought him cold, that his manner, his politeness was merely formality." A slight squeeze of his arm, her voice slightly teasing - how strong she is, how amazing that this woman is his wife. "I know how you Archadians are, with all your fancy words. Yet, after all that happened… he did not have to be so… so gentle. He was kind to me. It seems impossible to even say it, I did not expect that."

Of course, Vayne could be lying about absolutely everything. The crest of House Solidor, twin serpents for a _reason_, and Loren could just as easily wake up to find all his worst fears at his doorstep.

"Was it really her? The princess?"

"I don't know." He'd rather not talk about that, somehow even more painful, more frightening than anything the Lord Consul can do. That Ashelia of Dalmasca might come and demand fealty of her people, that his wife will be forced to choose between them - or worse, that it would take her no time at all to do so. As if she can feel the bend of his thoughts - or perhaps with how closely he's pressed himself to her, her hand slides down to his, twining their fingers together, a silent promise.

He must protect his family, though it may leave him at odds with the whole world.

Loren shuts his eyes, but for a long time after there is little peace, on what has surely been the longest day of his life. He listens to his wife's breathing, trying his best to relax. Risa is a Dalmascan noble, her late father leaving her with enough to get by, though she is by no means rich or highly titled. House Rhedan is of no great consequence, yet he still knows more than she does, that even if Vayne Solidor is true and just and honestly means them no harm, he is also but one short step away from the Archadian throne. Loren knows enough of politics, that there will be considerations, there will be acts of necessity beyond any one man's fate, beyond even Rabanastre itself. Sacrifices are always made, even by the best of men with the kindest of intentions.

_"… we will have it with Rabanastre as our vanguard or we will have the war_ _on top of them__."_ It was not a threat, merely the reality, that there is nothing yet in Dalmasca to make either side give pause or consideration. It is the true weight that he feels, of the conflict that looms before them, a princess risen from the grave and a day that is nothing at all like the way it began, and in the end Vayne will do what he must, and there are like to be no easy answers.

Loren lies in bed, as frozen as a child fearing untold monsters in the shadows. The sharp pang of nostalgia - for a world of fears that could be named and vanquished and forgotten - follows him down into his dreams.


	14. a permanent blur 1

Always more interesting to put the fires out when they are, in fact, actual fires. At least those are mostly extinguished by the time Vayne's managed to clear out the palace guests, alternately accepting apologies and making reassurances and scheduling meetings five deep for the next three weeks. What he's saying isn't all that important, just that he is there, calm and in control for all to see. The more swiftly the world is put in order, the better it will be to forget it ever happened. He's already ordered for repair crews, and whatever the gardeners need to start filling in the holes in the landscape left by cannon fire.

No retaliation from Rabanastre, from its citizens, and even if they hadn't doubled the guard Vayne is sure would still be barren in front of the palace, hardly anyone in the streets. He had taken a bit of time to examine the bodies of those killed in the initial assault - fine steel to a man, better weapons than any cobbled-together rebellion could have managed on their own. Not impossible, that Ondore might be assisting, though it seems unlikely he would have wasted resources on such foolishness. So the princess acts alone, with those nobles left in Dalmasca she could rally to the cause - but this is not truly a rebellion of the people, or surely she would have called for their aid even before his arrival? Certainly, they would be at the gates, in the streets even now?

The girl fancies herself a revolutionary, yet she does not look to her people, and there are none among her followers willing or able to stand in council of when and how to strike - or perhaps they are as bent to revenge as she, and blind to all else. It is not the comfort it ought to be, that she is so untrained, unskilled - she is ready to die for her cause, Vayne has seen that well enough, and when there is nothing to lose all becomes possible. Ashelia of Dalmasca, ruled by only the demands of her heart, with every vow of justice and honor, every hero's ballad to urge her on. Even if she were not Raithwall's heir, it would be foolish to discount her - lesser men have murdered greater kings.

"Get back here, you stupid bird!"

"Wark!"

Finally, a momentary lull, no immediately pressing task, and so Vayne has stepped out into the grounds for a breath of fresh air. A full day now on his feet, and who knows how many more hours until there is news. He is not quite able to compete with those among Cid's staff who live off coffee and calculations, but Vayne does what he can. The day will catch up with him, if he allows it, but there can be no rest until Ghis has made his next move, for good or ill. The Judge Magister will take full advantage of any inattention, just as Vayne is taking advantage of Judge Telkiris, who has unthinkingly acted as a sensible man would and retired for the day, shifting his obligations to the morning guard. Anyone in Archades could have warned him against such a move, the Emperor long known for pushing certain motions through at late hours, when the Senate is not watching. Creatures that live under rocks do their best work in the dark, and Vayne has found it useful to adopt the practice. It takes perhaps half an hour to undo the stupidest of the orders the Judge has made over the past few months, swiftly undercutting much of his authority without raising any fuss. After what has happened, Vayne can likely cut him free within a fortnight, and he will be glad to go.

"… stuff you in a pillow if it were up to me."

"Wark wark!"

Here he stands, then, watching a soldier - perhaps a bit overconfident in the sturdiness of his armor - attempt to negotiate with a rather irritated bird. It seems most of the chocobos escaped during the assault, and have been escaping ever since. Rather unhappy to be disturbed from their slumber by cannon fire, doing what they can to insure all are aware of it. The bird has its tail up, wings fully out and every feather fluffed, and Vayne is impressed that anyone would still consider a frontal assault. The man is quick to lunge for the beast's neck, but his arms snap closed on empty air as it dodges, lashing out with a foot before darting off into the dawn. The soldier swears sharply as he picks himself up off the ground, gingerly limping off in pursuit.

A dark green shadow detaches itself from the trees, moving in the other direction, and Vayne pauses just long enough to snatch a handful of greens from an upturned bucket left in the dirt - some unsuccessful prior effort - before following. There is a treat they prefer, even more than greens - his brother has said so, but Vayne can't quite recall what it is.

It doesn't take long to find his quarry, the emerald-colored bird drinking from one of the wide reflecting pools that surround the palace. Vayne makes no move to stay hidden or silent, and the chocobo quickly lifts its head, hissing an ill-tempered warning. It's Larsa who can do this properly, of course, but Vayne has paid attention to what his brother says and does with the beasts often enough. The most difficult part is being completely calm, as he moves within range of a beak and claws that could easily tear him inside out if it panics - and it will panic, unless he stays completely calm.

"Easy there, easy." The bird makes a soft trill at the sound of his voice, head tilted to the side but still rigid with tension. Armor or no, he is a still a stranger, and will be given no quarter - though that is hardly news. Green feathers snap apart beneath his boot heels, scattered all over the grounds, every bird including this one half-molted from the strain of their sudden awakening. It takes a well-trained warbird to handle cannon fire at close range, which seems to include not a single one of those in the palace.

"Well, you are a lovely creature, aren't you?"

Terribly smart, and he's never known one that didn't love being praised. Vayne keeps his hand extended, well in view, moving slowly closer, the chocobo motionless in that way that either is encouraging or means he's about to have his lungs kicked out. The bird lets out a low, disgruntled 'wark' of warning, almost a challenge, and Vayne stops where he is, hand still outstretched, though he can't help but smirk. Now _this_ he knows, the issue no longer a matter of panic or fear but disgruntled weariness, a bruised ego. It knows he is trying to apologize, the motion up for consideration but by no means certain to be accepted.

"Rest assured, I will not be wearing this night as a badge of honor."

Especially if Gabranth does not manage to gain the princess. If she retreats and is lost, there is no telling when he'll be able to free himself of Ghis. The Judge Magister is no doubt ready to take advantage of any opportunity to keep in Rabanastre, to look for the Shard, report on all of Vayne's affairs and generally make himself as much of a hindrance as is possible. It took considerable discussion just to get the Ifrit repositioned outside the walls of Rabanastre instead of hovering directly over the palace, and though a city in the desert is, perhaps, the proper place to build foundations on sand, Vayne had hoped for at least the chance _to_ build before it could all be pulled to pieces.

"At the moment, I fear I am rather low on diplomacy. However, in the spirit of great Archades, I am obligated to offer a bribe."

Unsurprisingly, the greens in his hand present the more compelling argument, the bird's head tipping in a manner that is far more curious than upset, letting out a few pleased little warks and chirps, taking one step closer, and then another.

Vayne has considered, long before arriving, the possible ways of bringing Dalmasca around - he does not need them patriotic, only stable. Profitable, a tactical asset to the Empire. A matter of bread and circuses, truly - not enough to be overt or insulting, but an opportunity for some small enjoyment, to give the people back their hope, even before Rabanastre might find its feet again. It matters, food and shelter, but men survive on the strength of their dreams, as much here as anywhere. A few races, or sporting matches, and due attention to the proper festival days - even a satire or two, a safety valve he will pretend to outlaw, that he might control even the measure of their dissension.

Vayne will have to work those plans in tandem now, with all that has happened at the fete - and should he take hold of the princess, what then?

Always the simple solution, to kill her as a nameless usurper. A girl and nothing more, and swiftly crush the backlash - but nothing would be accomplished then, the seeds of enmity sown far too deep for Rabanastre to be anything but a tinderbox waiting for the match. He might keep her under house arrest, locked in the palace, though that would make her more of a symbol than ever, a rallying point, and Ondore and Rozarria would be sure to take full advantage. Vayne holds out some slim chance - overlooking no possibility, no matter how small - that her hatred might not be so cast in stone, that there might at least be some negotiation. If there is a civil war in Rabanastre, it will be one of attrition, and Archadia has far more men to spare. Ashelia of Dalmasca may be convinced to sheathe her useless sword - he would want her away from any weapon regardless, when he proposes the possibility of marriage.

A matter purely of state, to link Dalmasca to Archadia - to protect her land from both Rozarrian incursion and Archadian response. It would satisfy the people of Rabanastre to have her among them once more, there would be no need for further rebellion. She would be their Queen and ruler, and save for a few public appearances, she would never have to be in the same room with him. A bit troublesome, if he truly does insist on dying, but certainly nothing to worry her. If only Vayne could mention it - that she could watch him choke on his last breath might very well sweeten the deal.

One last chirp brings him out of his thoughts, as the chocobo shifts its wings, ruffling its feathers, and tips its head, nipping the greens out of his hand with an almost absurd delicacy, letting out what sounds amusingly similar to a human sigh. Vayne reaches up with his other hand, scratching beneath the beak, running his hand along the long neck, fingertips finding purchase in the paler green down beneath the feathers. The bird leans a bit into his hand, letting out a contented trill.

" You see? Perhaps it is not all as bad as it seems."

The beast wears a simple bridle, perhaps from some past effort to keep it contained, but it is content enough to walk at Vayne's side. Unfortunately, of the two of them, it likely has the better notion of where the stables might be.

"Lord Consul, sir?"

"Yes?" Behind him, the chocobo lets out a low, warning sound, the soldier stopping short - such odd, amusing tempers in the beasts. It seems Vayne has gone from undesirable to accepted in a matter of moments and a handful of greens. If only the rest of Rabanastre might prove so easy. "Is there news from Judge Magister Ghis?"

Gabranth isn't one for status reports, with any luck he will return with the princess in hand and Ghis none the wiser. Even if she knows nothing of the Sun-Cryst, who is to say she will not be the key to its retrieval?

"No, sir. We've nothing from the catacombs. The gates have been clear so far, we're searching everything that goes in or out as a precaution, and the streets are quiet. It seems… someone did unlock one of the treasury rooms, though, sir. We're not sure exactly how much was taken."

"Quite enterprising." Most likely one of the palace staff, taking advantage of the sudden chaos to gain themselves an early retirement. "It matters little, in the end. Keep me informed of any further discoveries, or if Rabanastre should grow… impatient. I expect no action to be taken without my direct order."

"Of course, Lord Consul. I am sent as well, to summon you to the Ifrit. His Excellency the Emperor has called - he wishes for a report."

"I shall be there presently." A nudge against his back, a beak resting for a moment at his shoulder, hoping for the possibility of further treats. Vayne considers letting it go up to talk to his father instead. Certainly, as much would be accomplished. "I would like this bird for my own. Have it seen to the stables for me."

"Of course, sir."

It finally comes to him, as he reaches for the bridle, handing it off to the soldier to avoid the certainty of having his fingers snapped at. "Pilchards."

"Sir?"

"Sardines. Chocobos prefer them even over greens, and the oils are good for their feathers. See if you can find some in the storerooms, and the birds should give you fewer problems."

"Right away, Lord Consul."

He is perhaps a dozen paces away when he hears a hiss, a curse and the sound of a chocobo running quickly away, the clanking of a man in armor chasing after. Lucky bird.

* * *

"The Imperial Commander has the bridge!"

The air on board the Ifrit has a similar metallic tang to that of the labs, a comfortable familiarity. Doubtful if any of Cid's are here, and they would be near the engines if they were, keeping an eye on the critical systems. The care and operation of the larger ships is a truly immense undertaking - once they are in the air, nothing less than a catastrophe will bring them back to earth. Few of the larger ships are sent up all in a piece, more often the mist engines and the primary glossair rings the first to go up, stabilizing the main hull as the rest is built up around it, smaller ships moving from ground to ship like a swarm of industrious bees. A challenge then, when any major piece wears through or needs replacing, a careful balancing act of support rings and secondary engines. For the most part the Judge Magisters like to keep any hint of Draklor far from their concerns, but there are times the ships demand naught but the best of hands to keep them running.

The radio room is empty on his arrival, the posted guard drawing the door closed once Vayne is past the threshold. He wonders if Ghis bothered relaying the first message on a private channel, alerting the Emperor to the attack on the palace, to the possibility of his demise, or had he broadcast it plain? Likely the sort of thing everyone would want to know about, though his subsequent survival had no doubt led to some disappointing breakfast conversation.

"Good morning, your Excellence. I trust that all is well in Archades."

"… Vayne. What has happened?" Distance and static make it difficult to determine the man's mood, but he can make the usual assumptions.

"A rather pleasant evening, all things considered. It seems there are many who are quite interested in allegiance with Archadia, and we should be able to do some good business here."

The pause is not due to any issues with the equipment. He can almost see his father fighting to keep his calm, just as Vayne has his shoulders set, his expression fixed, revealing nothing though he stands alone in the room. Old habits. Who would have thought he could survive long enough for old habits?

"What of the girl?"

"The insurrection force was small, and easily quelled. I am sure Ghis has already told you of the Ifrit's assistance in the battle. We have some of their number being shipped to Nalbina - the Judge Magister has gone into the passages below the palace, in the hope of chasing down its leaders."

"What of the _girl_, Vayne." Amusing, not to call her by name, as if anyone listening in would think they could mean some other formerly deceased princess. Vayne had been mostly alone in the presumption Ashelia yet lived - Ondore knew, no doubt, even as Vayne had pushed him to confirm her dead, the treaty signed, the tragic passing of the king on the eve of what had seemed a certain peace - yet most had considered her suicide as fact. Growing up in the court, Vayne would take no less than a corpse as proof enough - and even then, it might be useful to poke it with a stick.

"If she knew what we wished her to know, there would be a crater where Rabanastre now stands. Raminas confided nothing, I am certain of that."

"I will have her, and find out for myself. You are always far too sure, and on very little evidence."

"As the Emperor wills it."

"The people?"

"Wish to know if she proves true, though they may not be so eager for her order. It has been a long time without a proper peace, they are tired - they wish for stability, simply to know where they stand."

"Are you all right, Vayne?"

It never stops surprising him. Never without the pang of conscience - of wanting to believe it - though he has long since stopped expecting the gesture, or knowing it can be other than a lie. Nothing after he'd turned fifteen was ever really true, and all before might as well be cast into equal suspicion. He stands in familiar surroundings, but it was and is a battlefield and he is no longer the child to be stupid and vulnerable, to give up ground without even knowing it. The ignorance of youth, and Gramis had pressed full advantage, sent him scrambling to recover, that it is only now that he has his place, that he can look back - Vayne is not the son his father wished to survive. He would be willing to set a heavy wager on it.

"I am unharmed. It was… instructive."

His middle brother had long been destined for an ignoble end, with or without assistance, only a surprise that it had not been even more bloody, with further collateral damage. The eldest, though? Vayne's older brother - Gramis' first son and heir? First sons were special, those after might inherit everything else but never the name - the first child stood forever apart, and perhaps - just perhaps - the leash Vayne believed was meant for him had ever been aimed for another.

No way to ever be sure of it, if he had been intended, perhaps, as punishment, the unskilled assassin in the form of a younger brother - to kill or be killed - for some slight Vayne had never even known of. Or as a test, to see if the first son was indeed ready to rule, to make cold choices - and faced with Vayne's death or his own, his brother had taken the option Gramis in all his selfishness had not considered possible, had allowed him the final victory.

Vayne hopes not. How much easier, to be the eager cutthroat, than to imagine he had been loved most at the very moment he had taken it away.

"Larsa knows I am all right? I would not wish to worry him."

"He asked permission to visit Bhujerba, just after seeing you off. I saw no reason to deny it."

Stupid, to feel even the slightest clutch of concern. The Marquis is many things but he has never been one to place spite over strategy. He knows very well where the line is drawn, and what it means. Even if the princess escapes, even should she fly straight to him, it is unlikely their paths could ever cross, that she could ever come close enough to Larsa to…

Vayne would take her apart. Slowly. Bhujerba would follow, if only out of spite, and then Rozarria for the lack of aught else to do. He might even be able to delude himself, for a time, that it was all of any importance whatsoever.

"You may wish to reconsider at present, with things as they stand."

The day his father uses Larsa as pawn is the day his father dies. Of that, there has never been a question. Vayne feels his pulse thudding at his temples, forces himself to take a quiet, slow breath. He is tired. He gets distinctly more homicidal when he is tired.

"If the capture of a single girl presents such a difficulty for you, perhaps I ought to send further assistance?"

Keeping Ghis in check is one matter - and it would be Bergan, certainly, to arrive on his heels. The damage he could do in Rabanastre before Vayne might check him would leave little chance of returning to anyone's good graces.

A knock at the door, and he is grateful for the sudden interruption, the soldier bowing when Vayne bids him enter.

"Sir, there is word from the Judge Magister."

Vayne feels the moment's surge of triumph, erasing the whole of the evening's debacle - Gabranth has come through, the girl is found and there will be a solution in his favor, whatever his father's plans.

"I believe I shall not need to trouble you further, your Grace."

* * *

The notion has never quite left him, that he is not the one who is meant to be here. At times, Vayne cannot help but imagine what it would be if the first son of House Solidor had lived, and wonders how his brother might have done against the same opposition. Managing his father, defending against the Senate. The things he knew from age and experience that Vayne had to fumble through blindly, and how he might have managed far better than the Solidor that had been left behind.

And then there is the moment he steps into the antechamber to see Judge Magister Ghis with the princess of Dalmasca in one hand and the Dusk Shard in the other, and Vayne thinks that no one in any world could blame him if he just started firebombing.

He arrives, as he has been doing for hours, at the aftermath of some small conflict. A soldier escorting a young Rabanastran girl away, and she doesn't even seem to see him as she goes by. He has not a half-second to mark her before Ghis takes up all his attention, or more importantly the Shard in his hand, every skill Vayne has ever possessed working to keep his expression neutral. One can only imagine the gods are well entertained.

"Lord Consul, may I present to you the leader of the insurrection. The lady… Amalia, though I hear she wears a rather familiar face."

"We've met." Of course, the princess spits at his feet. Ghis lets out a little chuckle, lifting the bauble in his other hand - and Vayne feels the slightest, sympathetic twinge from his wounded shoulder - power calling to power. It is not the most beautiful gem in the world to be sure, the color beneath its surface not unlike that of a murky pond despite the sharpness of its facets. The Midlight Shard had been prettier, albeit briefly.

"Deifacted Nethicite? So this is it, at last. I must say, I am not so impressed. Rather a small thing, for-"

Ghis trails off, as the stone begins to glow, a soft light - and Ashelia looks to it and then to Vayne. If she did not know what it was at the start, it seemed she has learned in the interim. If her hands were not bound behind her back - and even then she is considering it, and truly Vayne wonders why she hasn't yet, just taken it up and wished the world away.

"All of Rabanastre, for my sake?" Vayne says, watching the muscle work in her jaw, as she pretends not to understand him. "I doubt I am worth the price."

Ghis hands the Shard away to one soldier, the princess to another, less interested in either at the moment, now that he has presented Vayne with the totality of his success. "… and you to keep your little kingdom. The Emperor will be well pleased, I should think."

"You have done quite well as always, Judge Magister. When I have thought up the proper commendation as Lord Consul, you shall be the first to receive it." Silver-tongued, it is his gift, yet this is all there is to it, that he may speak pleasantly even when the words curdle in his mouth. First Nabradia's king gone, then Raminas fallen, Vayne's chances at the Sun-Cryst all whittled down until he stands here with the Shard and the princess and neither of them in his grasp. She will be tortured, to reveal information she does not have, and left to rot in some Archadian cell, while the Shard - well, if it ends up in Cid's hands it will only be after they've managed to blow up half the city first.

"Gabranth is also due his honors. It was with his assistance that we were able to capture the pack of thieves accompanying her." Surprisingly magnanimous, though perhaps in light of his victory Ghis wishes to take every advantage in lording it over as many others as possible.

"Release them, they have done nothing!" Ashelia protests, with all the unquestioned authority of a queen in exile but Vayne is not listening, his attention focused not on Gabranth but the prisoners with him. One of them already down, a young Dalmascan boy, probably sent to the floor by a guard who would soon regret having to drag his dead weight away. The second a Viera, which would give him no short pause save that the third - standing in a disinterested slouch and looking anywhere but back at him - is Balthier.

One thing, to have allies - but a good enemy, in the right place? By the gods, he will salvage victory from this yet.

Amusing, that the sky pirate thinks he has any chance of hiding, nigh impossible to mistake him for any other man.

_The very image of your father, whether you take pride in it or not._

Vayne finds himself taking note on Cid's behalf - he looks good, considering the present circumstances. Hale and hearty - the years have wrought no ill effect - it seems the strictures of his moral immorality suit him well. At once it is all too obvious that Balthier, of anyone, would be here now. A perfect tale of grand adventure, is it not? The mystic relic, the beautiful princess in need of aid, and Vayne himself the black-hearted villain. Balthier has no choice now, but to save the girl in some stupidly extravagant way, and the Shard along with her. The boy must have been his way into the palace vaults, though from what Vayne has read Balthier is not usually so sloppy, to avoid dragging his accomplices into trouble.

"Well done, Gabranth. If you will see your prisoners to Nalbina with Ghis, and proceed then on to Bhujerba."

"My liege."

A procession then, the princess hiding fear with scorn and pride, Ghis smug and Gabranth silent, and there is one moment when they pass, when Balthier looks him in the eye and knows that he knows, and Vayne lowers his voice, just enough to be heard -

"If it takes you a full hour to get out of there, I will be deeply disappointed."

- and then he is alone in an empty room, with the bell tower that Rabanastre marks its day by chiming half-past one in the afternoon. Vayne is well aware that it is nothing like a plan, that he is not thinking far enough ahead, for how the situation has changed. He is also aware, though, that if all he can do is ponder ways to sabotage the Ifrit, he's gone well past being able to tell the good ideas from the bad. It would please Ghis to no end for him to make some grand mistake now, the final coupe de grace, that the Judge Magister could return to Archades with the princess and the Shard and the head of the Emperor's treasonous son on a pike.

Sleep first, then plan. By the time he wakes, the Ifrit may be at Nalbina, and even that might be enough time for Balthier to gain the Shard, and then... and then negotiate. Entirely possible that the sky pirate will take it simply to keep it out of Vayne's hands, and at least that means he will know where it is, and if Balthier's loyalty is no longer to the Empire he is at least loyal to his own code, and no dashing sky pirate would give over such a weapon to anyone, for any reason. Strange, to know it will be safer in the hands of a traitor than those of a Judge Magister, yet these are such interesting times.

"Milord? May I… may I be of service?"

Standing in the front hall, half lost in thought, Vayne realizes he is staring into space - and also that he has made it from ship to celebration to aftermath without ever bothering to determine the location of anything but his office.

"I don't suppose you know where I might find my quarters?"

"Your Grace?" A moment, to realize he is indeed serious, and the girl blushes and immediately lowers her eyes, that she would ever think his question as stupid as it obviously is. "If it pleases, Lord Consul, you may follow me."

Vayne imagines that he could live the life of a common man without much in the way of complaint, but there is something rather wonderful about being able to stop caring, pulling off boots and coat and knowing someone else will get them polished and cleaned, or perhaps simply replaced. Nothing he needs attend to at the moment but a shockingly hot bath in a mercifully quiet room.

"I am not to be disturbed." He warns, enough ice in his tone to make the soldier at the door shift where he stands.

"Of course, Lord Consul."

Overdramatic, perhaps, but to a purpose. No way to tell if his father has noticed, or thought anything of the new habit of banishing his valet while still wearing most of his clothes. A necessity, with the marks of the Midlight Shard across his shoulder, scattered like a constellation of dying stars along his side. Vayne strips down, kneeling at the side of the tub, dipping his right arm in to the shoulder. Hissing against the sharp pain, like frozen flesh slowly thawing, but it doesn't last long, and once it has receded to a dull throb he sighs, and slips gratefully into the hot water. If this were all the reward of being the emperor of all creation, it would be more than enough.

The world goes blank, and dark before Vayne can even remind himself not to fall asleep.


	15. a permanent blur 2

Vayne Solidor is dead.

He lifts a hand up slowly, staring at the sky between his fingers, and wonders just how it happened. The near-translucent clouds pass slowly overhead. High above, to be as thin as they are, and all is quiet and still and peaceful.

It is some quality of the light, perhaps, that tells him this is other than dreaming. He does not dream often, and little of that worth remembering - no, this is different, this is new. Vayne presses his hand over the silence where his heart ought be, and the pulse at his throat for good measure - nothing. So here he is in the grass with the sky above and he wonders which god let his attention wander, that a Solidor would ever find himself in paradise.

Pressing himself to think back, to remember what must have been the knife at his throat, perhaps a fortunate pistol shot or some lucky arrow - no, the rebel and his thrice-damned spell. Surely that must have been it, the damage greater than he had anticipated. His recovery but a temporary victory, fate catching up with him when Vayne had finally allowed himself to feel the full of it.

Merciful gods, he's gone and died in a _bathtub_. Vayne groans slightly, grinding his palms into his eyes - no great battle or stubborn last stand, no gravitas or glory or the hint of dignity to be had in it. Not even the time to secure himself, that they might see fit to bury him in Rabanastre, if only for the better chance to dance on his grave. He could have at least had the sense to let the princess cut him down, she would have tossed him into the sands for the beasts, and that would have been the end of it. Instead, they'll - well, first they'll likely laugh about it - then dry him off, wrap him up and ship him home. A full state funeral with all honors, and then installed in the family crypt, with his father likely soon to follow.

The two of them, side-by-side. Forever.

_This is _why_, Doctor, and with all my effort, I could change nothing in the end._ Cid always wondering at the risks he took. Forever refusing to hesitate, ready to step into the worst of what might come, for the quiet hope of avoiding just this fate. If he'd died in a proper airship crash, or as a bystander in some lab accident - nothing left to put in a coffin if he were reduced to less than Mist and air.

The full weight of the thought falls on him then, and he shuts his eyes, a solid blow - _Cid_ - and yes, of course, the far worse - _Larsa_. Only those, in the whole of the world, who might care that he is gone, or would even choose to remember him.

Would it were within his power, Vayne would have stayed behind, a silent warden at his brother's shoulder, a willing ghost. He had done his best, all that he could manage, but will it be enough? Now, with the princess and her Shards in play, that could spell such disaster for so many? Will it be enough for her now, that he is dead? Will his father relent, and bestow all necessary blessing on his only remaining son, now that the threat Vayne posed is gone?

It seems the dead can still feel fear, for he can imagine all too well, how Gramis' relief could fade into some new, bitter delusion - it never lasts, _never_ enough for him - and Larsa alone, with no one to even tell him that he stands at the precipice. Raised up only that he could be torn down again, just as his brothers before him.

_Tell him, Cid. I would not ask it of you, but there is no one else who will._

Let him at least have the chance to do so. Draklor has been lifted up to some tenable position, but what of its future? Can it endure without his protection? In even that, the best of worlds, will the good doctor have anyone left to bother drawing him from his work? Remind him that there is a world worth taking a turn in from time to time, outside of his charts and figures and endless dreams?

It will be lonely here, with no Cid to lecture him on things Vayne never knew he was ignorant of. He had not even considered it until now, that he will never get to see the man Larsa is only just becoming, that Vayne never doubted he would be. It seems that he truly will miss his life, far more than he ever thought possible.

He sighs, opens his eyes again, the sky still blue, the clouds barely shifted. No sign of his brothers, or King Raminas of Dalmasca, or all the lost souls of Nabudis and gods know how many others are due their tithe of him. Certainly, this is some divine oversight, soon to be cleared up, so he may as well get a full view of things, in whatever whatever parcel of eternity has been allotted for him to take it in.

It is not a poor attempt at paradise, by any means. A wide green garden, dotted here and there with small white flowers, a few willow trees sweeping low to the ground. The burbling of water through carefully cut channels, spilling down a terraced path. Stone walls obscure his view of much else, and Vayne chooses his direction on the first break in the wall he can see.

Dead in a bathtub. Gods above, and every clever scholar will make sure to note that amusing detail, he is certain, for as long as they care to remember him. Vayne Solidor, skilled politician, cunning manipulator and fratricide twice over, stupidly dead before the sun could set on his second day in Rabanastre.

No one else to be seen, nothing to hear but a soft ripple of water on stone and the occasional bit of birdsong, the stone-walled paths not quite a maze. The further he walks, the more he thinks it may be a ruin of some kind, repurposed into a garden - but what has heaven the need for former tenants?

He has his answer, and the first thought that this might be other than his own personal afterlife, as the stone walls suddenly part, giving way to the view of a city unlike any in Ivalice, though Vayne thinks it might be a close match, were Archades half-sunk into the sea.

Half a breath to wonder at it, the cluster of tall, bright spires glinting like blades in the sun, before the deep, keening cry pours down through him. He's been in Draklor, when they've put the larger engines through their paces - a dreadnought class at full power owns every inch of the room, a resonant howl that dominates both breath and heartbeat and this is little different, though Vayne is unprepared to lift his eyes to the sky and actually see it in flight. Nothing like a ship of Archades, nor those of Rozarria's make - this is all smooth curves and smoother motion. It doesn't look like metal, doesn't _move_ like metal, the hull blue-green and even that changing, deeper shades shifting beneath the surface and if Vayne knew such things were not impossible, he would swear it _lived_. Practically the size of the Shiva, such a thing certainly not-

"Magnificent, isn't it?"

The man has come from nowhere, though there is no particular reason to expect logic here. A lifetime in Archades leaves him tense and wary, though Vayne just as swiftly tosses it aside - rather foolish to bother with caution here, in the land of the dead. It must truly be, for such a companion. The man is not quite transparent, though there is an odd insubstantiality to him, as if he might yet flicker at the edges at any moment. He does not look as he ought, not the way history has chosen to enshrine him. Younger than he has ever been portrayed, the cut of his clothes oddly… modern, nothing that Vayne has seen of the history he has studied - but there is no doubt at all as to his identity.

"You are King Raithwall."

The man smiles back. It is gentle, and distant, and wistful, as if he is not here but already looking back, nostalgic for what he has yet to say. Perhaps he is - Vayne has little precedence in the ways of ghosts, or how the hours might choose to turn when all ties to the world have been cut away.

"I am what remains." He turns slowly, the easy grace of a long, unquestioned rule in every step. "Will you walk with me? It has been some time since I have entertained visitors."

Vayne does, glancing from the man to the sky and back again, though the ship has moved on now, toward the city on the horizon, buildings half on and half in the ocean in a way that seems entirely deliberate, though that makes little sense. It is not in his nature to press the issue - Vayne has a lifetime of being patient, waiting for the answers to present themselves, and now that he has nothing but time, it seems a waste to do otherwise. Raithwall is quiet for a moment, hands clasped behind his back, as calm and ineffable as the trees, or the wind.

"What may I call you?"

"Vayne Carudas Solidor. Lord Consul of Rabanastre. Imperial Commander of the Western Armada. Third son and heir of our House." Raithwall is amused already, and Vayne shrugs, well aware nothing of what he is will impress the man who once ruled over _all_ of Ivalice - yet he did ask, and if this is not the time to drag out all titles for a proper inspection, then when? "Son of his Imperial Majesty Gramis Gana Solidor, ruler of the Archadian Empire."

"You will take the throne, then?"

"We elect."

"Of course you do." Raithwall says, and laughs. It is a warm, inviting sound, and Vayne can very much imagine him sitting serene and wise on his throne, guiding all of Ivalice through its long, golden age. "It is still Archadia and… Rozarria, then, is it not? My troublesome children."

"You know of us?"

"Now and then." Looking at him, and it is rare for Vayne to be met with such a direct gaze, but if there is any who stand on higher authority it is this man, certainly within his rights to do so. Raithwall reaches out, taps lightly against his shoulder, where he bears the mark of his arrogance, that may or may not have meant his death - Vayne is less certain of it by the moment.

"You have changed more than you know, by that. They will not be pleased that you still live."

"Few ever are." Solidors are remarkable survivors, nearly all successful assassinations kept within the House. It is not entirely unique, and they are certainly not the only House to take pride in their… durability. If the spirit speaks truly - not dead. At least, not yet. "You speak of the Occuria."

"Ah, yes. We are… old friends." Still gentle, still amused, but there is a hollowness in his tone that is anything but comforting. "You are Lord Consul of Rabanastre now, Archadian? Tell me then, of my Dalmasca, and what has become of her."

Vayne doesn't wince, though he can see the appeal of it. "Dalmasca and Nabradia have fallen to Archadia. Nabudis was… lost, to the Midlight Shard. King Raminas is dead these two years, and though his daughter fights to reclaim her throne, she seems to know little of you, or the Shards, or the Sun-Cryst."

"He wished to protect her." Raithwall says softly. "I cannot fault him that. The house of Dalmasca has borne up my sins so patiently, for so long. I had not the right to ask even for that which they gave." He shakes his head slightly. "The deeds you will find yourself doing, because deeds must be done. Do they think of me, still, in your grand age?"

"You are, as ever, the last noble king of Ivalice."

The laugh is too loud, joyless and empty and jarring enough for Vayne's hand to slip for a sword he isn't wearing. What good could it possibly do, even so?

"So that is what they say." Raithwall smiles to himself, a crippled thing. Nothing in him not touched by grief, it is easy enough to see it now. "I was not much to speak of, as a boy, do you know? Lazy, and easily distractible. I dreamed too much. If you had asked then, upon my first victory in battle, it was said that I turned out better than expected - and that a high compliment. I could not even compose a speech to save my life." Vayne remembers what Cid said, about Venat, about the cruel gift of eternity, and there is an echo of it in Raithwall's gaze. "We are never who we are, even when we are remembered. Especially then."

Still with no idea where they are, the city nothing Vayne recognizes though the land seems familiar, perhaps only in that way the sea defines any space it borders. It has not been a slow, steady progression of time around them, though Vayne cannot quite tell where the gaps begin or end, only that the city looms ever larger, closer than it should be for how far they have proceeded - and all at once they are surrounded by its towers, walking down a narrow street, similar to Archades by its dimensions but nothing else. The foundations of the buildings start as stone, but shift and weave into another form, glowing within the darkness as they curve upward into the sun, the buildings no more made of steel and glass than the ships are.

"In the older areas, the poorer districts, they simply worked over the buildings, installed fresh roots within the old foundations - the newer ones are simply grown from scratch." Raithwall gestures up, and Vayne can see how the highest edges of the buildings seem to sway, diaphanous and transparent, with more of those ships filling the skies like schools of multicolored fish. He wishes he knew what he was looking at, the way Cid would understand.

"I am not the one who should be seeing this." Vayne murmurs, and then, realizing what has been said, "… grown?"

"All alive. The buildings, and the airships as well. We never quite learned how they managed such wonders - it was both spellcraft, and not, and even when we tried to steal their secrets - perhaps humes simply lacked the knack for it. The ships are born, far more than made. I saw it once, before the war - they come right up out of the sea. It is a marvel." Raithwall is looking up, a kind of heartbroken wonder on his face, as if he is the one who has never been here before. "Do they have airships still, where you are?"

"Many." Vayne does not bother keeping the pride from his voice. "Archadia is in its renaissance."

Raithwall smiles, almost mischievous. "Have you made it to the moon, then?"

"You are joking." Vayne says, half-laughing along with him, and thinks that it is a shame there will never be the chance to truly face him, to try at politics with this man, dead now for a thousand years. "What did we miss? I admit, I do not know all my history, but this-" He gestures out, up. "This is not any world I have heard of, and seems far more the future than the past."

Raithwall goes suddenly silent, and still. If Vayne had wished to do less harm, he might have considered a knife through the heart.

"It should have been. Gods have mercy. I didn't know… I didn't…"

He murmurs brokenly, shuffling away like an old, old man. Vayne curses himself silently, following down the street, to where the buildings fall away from a wide center plaza, and above them airships and in front of them, stretching out, a glowing city beneath the waves, its buildings just peeking out as the tide moves in and out. Around him, a people unlike anything Vayne has ever seen.

Similar, in some way, to the bangaa, but taller. Slender and graceful, tails swaying elegantly behind them as they move swiftly on three-clawed feet. A delirium of shades that would impress any painter, pebbled skin in blue and green, shifting to the reds and oranges of a sunrise, others the color of dappled clay. The plaza is tiled in small white stones, like some sort of shell, in intricate patterns around several fountains - water everywhere, spilling over the edges of buildings, snaking through channels where more of the creatures sit sunbathing, feet dangling into the cool stream that flows to the open ocean. The creatures move in and out of the sea carelessly, hardly seeming to notice the difference between water and air.

What Vayne thinks must be a girl brushes by him, and her laughter sounds like a flute, vibrantly played - obviously a language as her companion responds in kind, though no hume tongue could ever hope to match the sounds. Wearing white at the waist, the green skin of a smooth chest exposed down to a golden belt, a skirt that splits high. She has bells on her tail, jingling as it twitches back and forth with her mood.

"The wealthiest live beneath the waves, and some never bother to come to the surface at all. I had heard that the problem started there… those who never saw the sky felt no need to treat with us, who could not even go down to petition them properly. When the war began in earnest, we were forced away from the coastlines - they took our shipping routes as one would snatch a child's toy, and those were… never recovered. It was rare, after that first year, that we bothered setting foot more than fifty miles from the shore."

He can hear music coming from a window, intermingling with the sounds of the crowd. A few children play near the central fountain, while mothers or nursemaids chat idly by and it is entirely peaceful, and just from that, Vayne can imagine how badly things are going for the other side.

"You weren't winning."

"We were holding our own." Raithwall says, as a tumble of melodious voices rise and fall over the price of a pear, the market stretching out down the alley near where they stand. "I know that now. At the time, it seemed… it is funny, isn't it? One moment you have your allies, or at the least there is no quarrel between you - and then there is a disagreement. A fight for territory. A resource, a need, and they push and you must push back, or else appear weak - and suddenly you have always hated them. Always feared them, and it must be war, and once your men start dying, what is there to do but push ahead? What solace for their families, for your country but retaliation, to show that they did not die in vain? Before long, it justifies itself, as relentless as the ocean against the shore."

"-and there is no glory like that of battle." Vayne says. No need to expound on war for an Archadian's sake. A slow, cold awareness is creeping upon him - it is what he does, what he is for. Finding the patterns, charting the likely future from endless possibilities, or in this case, the past. A grieving shade. An enemy he has never seen, has never even heard of. The will of the gods. "What did you do?"

"None of them think about the war, here. We never came within sight of this place. Or perhaps they are well aware, and only wish their sons, their fathers home again." His voice trembles, eyes fixed to the horizon. "I cannot even remember the name of their god."

"Your Majesty," Vayne says, carefully, "what did you do?"

"I sat in council. I listened to my generals tell me that we had no time, that they would see the end of us. We might have diminished, surely, might not have been what we were - but they spoke only of annihilation. Kill them, or they would destroy us. Such foolishness. Our allies, they had their own business - the moogles stuck to their guilds, the Seeq made their own treaties. I was not… with every soldier lost, my people looked to me, and I felt their doubt, their shame. The growing suspicion of those around me, that I was not fit to protect my country. I watched our cities burn - and one night, while I paced the halls and prayed for wisdom… no, for deliverance, coward that I am…"

"The Occuria."

"Would that I had never been born, and the war had never ended." He is pale, no - Vayne can nearly see through him now. "I knew… to defeat them, that there would be a price, no matter what they promised me. If it was to be my life, my soul - if I could save my kingdom, I would endure. I thought I knew, I _thought I knew_…"

Raithwall makes a soft, terrible sound and Vayne follows his gaze, such a subtle oddity that at first he misses it entirely. A strange flicker in the air, nothing more, perhaps a few feet raised from the stones near the center of the square. No one has noticed it - there is hardly anything to see, a tiny disturbance, slowly curving outward - a sphere-shaped reflection, suspended in the air.

"The Sun-Cryst is the axis on which all the world spins. I do not know how the Occuria created it, or for what purpose. Only that, once born, it was no longer interested in listening."

A flash of yellow catches Vayne's eye. A ball, tossed into the air and falling back down into the clawed hands of a child, with a tail all but too big for his body, lashing sharply as he focuses on his game, bouncing and chasing his prize across the stones.

"Our world stretches like a thread between them, waiting to snap."

All around them, the sounds of the city, the sun shining down. Raithwall is frozen, one hand outstretched, flexed in helpless misery, and the yellow ball bounces once, twice - and disappears without a ripple into the orb that has continued to widen, reflecting the tall, thin lines of the buildings into curves that nearly touch at the top, and the limitless sky.

"The Cryst reads the heart, and remakes the world in that desire." The king's voice a whisper, if that. He is crying, though he does not seem to notice, and the tears fall into the beard of an old, old man, the image Vayne has always known as the great ruler of Ivalice.

"I wished for peace. An absolute peace."

The child creeps up to the edge of the strange, reflective emptiness, obviously less interested in it than the loss of its toy, tail curved like a sideways question mark. Glancing away, for any sign of possible interference from a mother or maid, before turning back to the task at hand.

"Do you know what it means, Archadian? The cost of such a peace?"

The child stretches out a hand, disappearing into the mirrored void, searching for its toy - and draws back, staring in confusion at the space where his hand had been. No blood, not cut away - just an empty space. Vayne hears a scream, that melodic sound wrenched tight and high in panic, and there are arms around the child, pulling it away. It is too late, the Cryst's power past its event horizon, swallowing them both in an instant.

"A perfect world - only when there is no one left to oppose you."

It ought not to be so quiet, Vayne thinks. Silent, and the sky is so blue and they do not see their doom upon them. A few faces from the market, looking in the direction of the sudden scream but not understanding, even as it grows, as the wave washes over the stones and moves more swiftly with each moment, sweeping into the crowd. Cascading over the buildings, all fading to fog burned off by the sun, and then even less than that.

Vayne sees what might be a burst of magic, some desperate attempt to contain it but there is no stopping this - and he can listen to the silence sweep through the city without ever turning around, hear the panicked cries of those who have just enough time to see their fate, before it consumes them, as the buildings are swept up like stray cobwebs, those beautiful airships spun apart and fading as the stone beneath his feet turns to grass and sand.

Vayne has stood in the center of a city smashed to ruin by Archadian fire. The smell of charred bodies, with blackened ash rising into the sky. Walked along the stretch of a battlefield, with the cries of the wounded still rising. He has been to Nabudis. An entirely different world, for such a thing as this, to stand on a green hill, overlooking the steady waves. Listening only to the wind blow against the tall grasses -and there is maybe one final, fluted cry, or perhaps it is simply a gull, and they are alone.

"Do you truly believe they wished to be phantoms? Gods who could do no more than bear witness to the world?"

Of course he had wondered. Vayne tries to speak, but finds he can only swallow instead. Gazing down into the ocean waves, as if there is anything left to see.

Raithwall's voice is hoarse and low. "The Occuria believe they can regain what was lost to them, that our world is their key. Feed enough power back into the Cryst, all those who never were - who were undone."

"You… but you are the reason we know of it at all. You cut the Shards, to ensure your legacy."

"My legacy?" The sound Raithwall makes is not, perhaps, entirely sane. "It made them laugh. I thought to shatter the Sun-Cryst, but I… I failed. I tried and I failed. I was gifted the Shards, and sent on my way. I could not find it again, that tower - the Occuria had rescinded their blessing. I had done as they wished. I was of no further use to them."

"Gifted."

"Of course." The smile, brittle and bright. "As you say, what would be their purpose, in allowing such a legend to die? The great Dynast-King of Ivalice and his golden age. The Shards, carved from the Cryst, relics that any great man of… peace… would desire. And I, to reign in glory to the end of my days, the only one to remember what I had done, or that we had once touched the very stars."

"But how would-" Vayne trails off. Understands, even before Raithwall speaks.

"If our enemies had never been, there could be no shared knowledge between us. No stolen secrets, no discoveries we claimed as our own to build on. Each country thinks itself independent, contained within its own victories. Defined by their successes, never seeing what has been taken from another. It was their knowledge, not ours, that helped send the first Moogle ships aloft in our lands. Ideas we never knew we had shared, that moved us down the path to greatness. We forgot, in the midst of war, that we were allies before we were enemies. Without them, we lost a thousand years. A thousand years of who we were, who we could have become - and my people loved me, loved me when they should have torn me to pieces."

"You didn't know."

"How could that ever matter, in light of what I _did_? At the end of my days, I could only pass the Shards down to those who I thought would be powerful in the ages to come, able to protect them, though it seems in that I was also mistaken. I do not… I do not believe the Occuria can choose another, as long as the line of Dalmasca yet lives. Or surely they would have done so by now."

So careful, Raithwall's heirs, never to let the bloodline go out too far. Vayne had studied the lineages, even before he'd received the consulship, surprised by their almost obsessive nature, the careful accounting of every heir. It seems but sensible now - and Vayne realizes why he has been brought here to see this, what all of it is truly for.

"… Ashelia of Dalmasca will seek out the Sun-Cryst."

"The Occuria have had naught but time: to wait, to think of ways to rally her to their cause. Persuade and seduce and lie in the name of honor, and vengeance and salvation. My final act in life, to enscroll the Dawn Shard - they may be able to reach her, but she will learn of this day, should she take it up as her ancestors have done before her. The unforgivable sin that I committed here. It was all I could do, that the kings of Dalmasca would keep safe the secret, would never allow the Cryst to be so used. I do not know if it will be enough."

"Archadia killed her husband. We have murdered her father, and stolen her kingdom. I think she could learn to live with her regrets, to be rid of us all forever."

"Oh, if only it were so." A chuckle that burrows under Vayne's skin and stays there, raising every hair on the back of his neck. "It will be the Occuria's greatest victory, should they win the day. If it does not return to them what they wish to be, then nothing will." Vayne meets eyes like blazing ice, the man a ruin, a worn stone. "Don't you see? All that was lost here, all of Ivalice diminished - when we were not even of the same kind?"

Two separate peoples, no children that could cross those lines - no families, generation after generation building on that past. One people lost forever, but not the way it would be if they had been able to… oh, dear gods.

Raithwall nods slowly. "Every member of your Empire, gone. Every man, woman and child. Every citizen of Bhujerba, of Rozarria, with but a drop of Archadian blood in their veins, and all that they had done, and all that they had created, vanished from the world - and Ashelia of Dalmasca the only one, to know of the nightmare she had wrought upon all Ivalice."

The Dynast-Queen of some thatched-roof hut. Archadia has its roots deep - Raithwall knows as much, from his Alliance sprang the common core of all civilization. How far could it go? How many could she destroy?

Vayne would startle, as the world shifts around him once again, but after such a revelation he cannot imagine there is any worse that could come. A vague, senseless surprise, to realize the city is reforming itself, stones lifting up out of the dunes as the buildings rise around them, airships once more in the skies. Knowing what is to come, it all seems no more solid or real than a stage setting, some cruel joke. Citizens of a country that never will be, returned mid-step to busy lives that never were. If he but bides his time, Vayne is sure will see the child with his yellow ball.

Raithwall looks young again, face tipped to the sun, his eyes closed. Certainly, he already knows all that there is to see, an eternity here more than time enough to name each stone. Trapped within this endless cycle, to live the evidence of his terrible mistake again and again, existing within this moment as the eons fade into eternity.

"It would be better for every brick and stone in Dalmasca to be scattered to the winds, than to walk this path again. Do not let her do this, Archadian. Do not let my sin become hers. It will destroy her, as it has ended me."

"You… surely, you need not stay here."

"Who is left, that could grant me absolution?" Raithwall looks at him, and smiles, and Vayne thinks _here is such a king_ and he will never be so brave, there is no one that will ever match the Dynast-King. "I am less than a thought, yet I am all they have. The only one left, to remember them."

"I will remember this." Vayne says, and holds out his hand, gripping the other man mid-forearm. It is not a kingly gesture but one of friendship, kinship, and so little, and nothing else he can do. "I will remember you."

* * *

Vayne wakes up. Alive. Mostly.

Splashing and gasping past a mouthful of water, his hand grasping tightly at nothing but the edge of the bath. He drags himself out before he can remember where he is or why, hitting the ground with a hard, wet slap. It is enough to send a jarring pain down through his bones, and at least that shocks him back to some sort of awareness, palms flat against the cold floor. Dragging in air as - yet again - his heart attempts to find a proper beat, pounding so hard it's making his vision blur, with a sour taste in the back of his mouth and Vayne remembers everything.

If only he could believe, even for a moment, that it had been a dream. What had been done - what is yet to come. Ashelia of Dalmasca and the Sun-Cryst, and the air is chill enough to make him shiver, what there is - all he is, here. Blood and muscle and bone against the end of all things - he is but one man.

_You are a Solidor._

Is there anything more insufferable than a fool who believes his own lies?

Tepid water pools on the floor around him, and other than that Vayne can't tell if it's been an hour or striking midnight, or if he is alone in his own purgatory.

A slight rap at the door. "Are you all right, Lord Consul?"

"Fine. I'm fine." Overloud, and less steady than he would like it, even with the door between them, but at least this truly is the world as he knows it.

A sad myth so many wish to believe, that enough money or power or glory can make a man untouchable, that there is a way to perfect equanimity - trouble always sizes up. A poor man might lose his holding, a merchant his ships, a lord his daughter to some unsuitable beau. In a way, it is almost a compliment that Vayne faces such opposition, that there is nothing that might test his skills but the destruction of all he knows.

Surely, he will die. Vayne will fail and he will die, they will win and Archadia will vanish from all memory save that of a girl who will live to pick through the remains. Or Ashelia will die, and the Occuria will be free to choose a new successor - a hundred, more. He has the suspicion that the wish won't matter much, in the end. Whatever and whoever touches the Sun-Cryst, it will likely crack the world in two.

He lets out a breath, not all that surprised to find himself grinning down at the marble floor. For a fleeting moment Vayne wishes he were a lesser man, to roll over and let fortune fall where it will. Certainly the easier fate than to fight, to struggle against such odds. But the fear does not matter, it has never mattered save as a lash to drive him onward. It is of no importance if he _can_ do this, only that he must and so he will.

_… and if you do fail, at least there won't be anyone left to write it down._

It is enough to get him off the floor, at least, and shrugging on his clothes. The first order of business, to get Cid here as soon as he can, and at least the doctor is quite familiar with having the world turn upside down on a whim, or this would prove slightly difficult to explain. It will be amusing to see his expression, regardless. The second order, once he has been notified of their escape, is to find Balthier, find the princess, and tell her that her father was right.

He pauses at the door, the room still quiet around him. The image of Raithwall in his mind's eye, and it will be long to fade. The Occuria play kings as pawns, and believe far too comfortably in their prowess at the game. Vayne will teach them the danger of backing a Solidor into a corner and expecting no retaliation. Of threatening a prince of the realm, and all who look to him for their protection, and thinking he will not act.

Set the stakes so high, and a man might very well do anything at all.

_Glory, glory great Archades._ The first bars of the anthem flit through his thoughts, unbidden but hardly unwelcome. What one pledges to, when it is time for war. _Long may you shine…_


	16. a kind of integrity 1

At fourteen, Balthier - he thinks of himself that way now, even in reminiscence - stole his first single-engine racer, an experimental model from his father's lab, long before he'd known to hate the name Draklor. This was after he'd enhanced two of his own well past their limits, substantially upgrading the engines for speed and power before upgrading them even further into a bevy of slightly charred scrap scattered across a length of lawn in the midlevels. The new, sleek craft had considerably more impressive limits, and he thought he'd managed to improve even on those.

Which meant that when he nicked the wall at twice past what should have been top speed, the crash was - by all accounts - a truly spectacular sight, and the fact that he hadn't been wearing a helmet seemed rather superfluous against his certain doom.

Balthier had bounced twice, unconscious before he'd hit the second time, and finally landed, smoldering and upside down in a hedge.

Three days and half the night later, he woke up, bandaged from head to toe and aching from a good deal of magic applied very quickly, feeling half out of his head, with Cid sitting nearby, going carefully over his ever-present collection of papers. It is the way Balthier best remembers the man who had been his father, before the days that had come to crowd out all others, before the Doctor and his experiments had replaced anything else worth remembering. Cid with his head bowed, intent on his work, the pen scratching lightly in unerring, brisk notations.

He must have made a noise then, because his father looked up, and in those days of long ago had actually set his work aside. Moved the chair closer to where Balthier lay, and asked him if he thought the crash had been a more of a issue with the brake systems or the ring alignment.

It is a fond memory, of a better time.

* * *

Mjrn is the one to find the body. Fran is out hunting when her sister appears, so wide-eyed and breathless that for a moment she cannot even speak, pointing back the way she has come.

It is a hume - or was. A male hume, and Fran can see where he must have fallen, a patch of earth made unsteady by the recent rains, just waiting for some unwary traveler to take a fatal misstep. As she makes her way down, catching at the vine-laced trees with her claws, Fran can see his head is tilted at an unnatural angle, his neck snapped. Quick and clean, from such a height he would have died instantly. She can hear Mjrn behind her, would keep her sister at a distance had it been a more violent end, but this is all but bloodless. So silly, these humes, that they live such short lives and seem eager to find new ways to whittle down even those few hours. Not the first hume to venture into their Wood, nor the first to die in it.

"Was he looking for the village?" Mjrn says in a small voice, keeping her distance. Jote often tells tales of humes, who know little more than how to steal and to destroy, who would seize the Wood for themselves and take it all, if the Viera did not have the blessing of the Green Word and the Wood's powerful magicks to keep them safe.

"Perhaps." Fran doubts it, not alone. He is oddly dressed for a conqueror, at the very least, no armor or fancy weapons. Only a short sword - and that is no surprise, even she would not wander the Wood unarmed. Fran approaches, hearing Mjrn inhale sharply behind her as she kneels down. The hume's pack has spilled out around him, Fran can smell tobacco, soap, the tanned hide of the bag itself. A flash of color catches her eye - pigments in a small metal box, like those they use in Eryut, though these are far more vivid: azure as blue as the sky, shades of purple and red that could match many of the Wood's brightest blooms.

A glimpse of the same hue near the body, and Fran moves closer, a small book still clutched, half-open in the lifeless hand. Fran murmurs a soft apology as she pulls it free, that he will understand it is only curiosity. Always better to respect those who walk the next path, whoever they might be, that they will feel no need to look back.

Mjrn creeps closer, looking over her shoulder as she slowly turns the pages. Words on the inside cover, more beneath some of the pictures. Meaningless to them, of course, though the drawings speak with an eloquence all their own. It seems the man was an artist as well as a traveler, and Fran has heard and seen of some of those peoples he has sketched out, all those who pass through the Wood. Seeq, and the bangaa, and moogles as well. The world outside is little like Eryut, and full of infinite variety. Full to bursting with humes most of all, she knows, in the north and south and all in between, all with their own rules and laws and little common allegiance. Cities packed with them, and the man has sketched some of those here as well, skylines so vast they cover two pages. Towers so tall he had set the book vertically to capture them in full, garlanded at their heights by airships, which Fran has ever only seen at a great distance, looking out from the very edge of the Wood.

Fran had passed up the chance at leading the village years ago, and there were those - her sister among them - who still wondered at her decision, confused by her reluctance. Jote, who may have known how she has taken to roaming in wider and wider circuits, but keeps her opinions, as always, to herself. The village had been enough, once, but looking down on these colorful pages, all the world's wonders, Fran cannot help but feel the return of a pang that is like nothing else so much as the Voice of the Wood, the Green Word, even though this voice speaks pure betrayal to all that she knows.

It it is a waste, her life in Eryut - the word is close to sacrilege but Fran cannot help herself for thinking it. She is foolish to move through her days here, one exactly like the next, when there is a whole world beyond. A whole new life, with nothing keeping her from it but the refusal to act, to move forward and _go._

"Look! I think that is Relj, there in his book!"

Mjrn leans down, as Fran turns the page to reveal a page of sketches of her sisters, and another, and it seems that yes, he was looking for a path into the village, though perhaps not with the ill-intent of those who have come before. The illustrations are very good, Fran believes she can recognize many of those who have ventured out of Eryut, the exiled. The viera are captured in fine and careful detail, along with studies of their weapons or armor, some of it foreign, other items she recognizes as village-made. A few of them are painted in profile, looking into some greater distance, and Fran wonders if any of them regret the choice. Knowing what they do, if they would yet again trade the wide world, no matter what its distractions, for the whispers of the Green Word that breathe even now beneath her skin, ever at her side. Living here in the Wood, where she is sleek and strong and silent. Jote would call it madness, has done so, but would she be as harsh, if Fran had not grown so fond of her solitary walks?

It will hurt to leave. It will hurt to stay.

"What do we do with the body?" Her sister says softly, and Fran sighs, and reaches out, runs the tip of one blunted claw along the edge of the dead man's face. So very young, even for a hume, to give up all that he knew and understood - to come to her world, seeking more.

"We will bury him. I believe it is what they do with their kind."

Fran does not think he would mind it, laid to rest here, to become one with the Wood. The work does not take long with Mjrn's help, and when they have made a proper grave she leaves to gather flowers for his feet, to welcome his first steps into the next world. Fran collects what has fallen from the pack, to set at his side, but stops herself, as she is about to put the book back into his hands. It is a decision to be made, right here, and though the change may happen slowly, she knows there will not be a going back. Her hand tightens, and then relaxes, and Fran realizes she is holding her breath.

If Mjrn even notices the slim tome in her sister's hand as they return to the village, she says nothing of it.

* * *

The sun is just considering its twilight arc, shadowed behind wide, flat bands of clouds that cover the western sky over Bhujerba. A strong wind ruffles her fur as Fran leans against the rail of a rooftop garden, claws delicately picking out the seeds of a pomegranate. It is her favorite indulgence, fruits that were once unknown to her: blood oranges and Rozarrian sweet pears, but especially the pomegranates. The city is well built up here, terraced houses on varying levels creating a canopy of rooftops, pathways cut here and there between them that end in high walls and, beyond, wide green spaces. Private gardens, thick with carefully tended flowers - the compounds of the elite. Great estates that might be home to but a single hume and yet span half the size of Eryut, and from where she stands her sharp eyes can pick out the lord and lady of the nearest of these as they move out of doors, slowly making their way to a small, private airship docked at small cliff at the edge of the property. A line of guards attends them silently, armor shining as the clouds shift and the sun briefly reappears.

Fran does her own scouting, always, even when the moogles' advice seems trustworthy. Only a few of them seem to work directly as thieves, and those mostly in teams, posing as workers or performing troupes. The rest are content to trade more safely in information, or as house staff willing to cut the occasional deal. A few coins, to ensure the right lock is flipped at a particular moment, or a window is left conveniently open after hours. Ubiquitous and unassuming, it seems a rare hume that can tell one from another with any sense of certainty, which tends to lower the risk of accountability, and they are all remarkably well-informed. Fran can't imagine that all moogles can know each other, surely not across all Ivalice, yet she had saved a mapmaker in a caravan she'd signed on to protect in eastern Archadia, and by the time she'd reached Balfonheim, some three weeks later, there had been a warm welcome - by name - from nearly every other moogle that she'd come across, no matter the guild.

Viera do not blend particularly well, though Fran has found she has many other useful assets at her command. Nimble and quick, able to adapt her tactics to any number of varied opponents, and she can usually smell out a trap tile from the other end of a room. Most importantly she is willing to be patient, to take as much time as is required to ensure her success. As much a humiliation as a danger, were she foolish enough to be caught.

At the beginning, fresh into the world, Fran had made her living from the forests well to the west of Eryut, their secrets still open to her even as the Green Word faded from her ears. It had been a difficult time, even knowing it would be so, and the ache of the loss had hewn her to the unfamiliar trees for longer than she had intended to stay. Still, she had been skilled enough to keep comfortable, trading pelts and wild mushrooms with whatever trader happened by. The tender delicacies were common enough to those of Eryut, but it seemed they were not easily found by humes, and considered a high luxury.

At last, though, Fran had become ill at ease with familiarity, the forests unnerving in their silence. She took to the trade roads, wandering and guarding nomads and travelers, those who would not, or could not carry their goods by air. She learned to read, both the hume standard and even some ancient Kildean, from a scholar making her own slow pilgrimage across what seemed nearly all of Ivalice, seeking out places of myth and legend connected to the Dynast-King. It was from her that Fran learned all she could ask of hume history - they were fascinating creatures, and the final word that seemed to rule them all - ambition - seemed both beautiful promise and terrible curse. The ambitions of small men to become great, of dangerous men to be warlords, even the holiest among them always seeking, ever striving for more. Had this been what the hume in the forest had brought with him? Passed it along to Fran even after his death, the final weight to tip the balance, the spark for her own great ambition?

The question haunts her, as the months turn to years, as time seems to linger, rather than pass by. What is it she seeks to do? What is so important here, that the Wood could not provide?

As a viera, new magicks come easily, though there are more spells woven by humes than those in the Wood could have ever imagined. Necessary, for a world with far more dangers, but as she continues on Fran finds she is not at all unprepared for the challenge. Noticed and feared for her sharp eyes, and sharper claws, the reputation of the viera alone enough to ensure peace on some journeys where she stands guard. She is respected, even feared, simply for her silence and - oddly enough - the way she looks. The humes think that she is beautiful, and that she is wise, and though Jote had looked at the outside world with scorn and pity, Fran does not find it as easy to cast judgment, as she walks among those who must live in it. Ivalice is as mercurial, as swift to change as a quicksilver fish. Even with her nimble speed she might as well reach out and catch nothing, and there has never been a Wood for any of those she meets - the desperate, the poor, the defenseless. No Green Word even in memory to guide them, let alone to call them home. It is a privilege, she comes to realize, that she chose to leave. A gift, rarer than she thought, that there is something in her past she can regret leaving behind.

So many people here, so many different _kinds_ of people, and Fran learns that there are those who will gladly turn predator to their kin, in this land where there is not enough for all. It is not difficult, then, to start collecting bounties, the hunting much the same for marks as it is for beasts, and the rewards far greater. It is still a challenge, the first few times she steps into a city to take up a hunt or collect her reward. Unnerving, disorienting with so many smells and sounds and people - but so many wonders as well. With her always is the book, and no matter where she is Fran takes her time, tracks down all that has been sketched and painted and spoken of on the pages she can now read. Fran knows his name, and someday she will find where this hume had lived, and if there are those who might wish to know of his fate.

He had drawn even where she is now, in Bhujerba: the narrow streets of the north quarter; the great waterfall that thunders over the nearest, disconnected island of land to the west, where water turns to vapor and cloud in midair. He'd painted the transparent shadows of the great jutting planes of crystal that tower benevolently over all, holding the whole island aloft - and there are more than a few places in the city with veins of raw ore strong enough to make her fur stand on end.

Bhujerba is a land of great wealth and power and elegance, with travelers ever moving in and out, providing an easy cover for all sorts of opportunity. The mark who had been the first to suggest she might consider such a life, it had been his view that the sky city was the best place to make fast money, and then simply disappear. Fran had taken him in after that, only to break him out an hour later, when the Judge who had placed the bounty tried to take custody without paying.

Her first step into a life of crime, and it had been easy enough after that. Fran had worked her way through a few Archadian cities - never caught, never even close - before buying a first-class ticket on a rather fine skyship, and a 'special' map of Bhujerba, the Moogles as proud to vouch for the locations of the city's finest houses and current owners as they were to point out the best tourist spots, though with their voices slightly lowered.

It isn't a necessary occupation. If she wished, Fran could make no small fortune simply by breathing. Viera are rare, and what is rare is precious, and she has heard there are those of her kind who are paid handsomely to pose for artists, or even more so simply to stand at the side of wealthy patrons, to do nothing more than be beautiful. It strikes her as utterly absurd, though the idea of theft itself is no less an oddity. No reason for any in Eryut to have more than what they had need of, and nothing even then that could not be easily replaced. The Wood provided always, even the concept of 'want' unfamiliar there. It is not so in the rest of Ivalice, where there are those who starve within sight of those who feast, surrounded by enough treasure to last them ten lifetimes.

Fran feels no pangs of conscience, taking from those who will not miss the loss, and the object she is after today is of particular, personal import, a Viera treasure. An unbroken length of a long-shattered staff, crystal-tipped. Several centuries old, and the man who has just taken off in his airship is in no way a good or noble man, and does not deserve to hold such a prize a day longer. Fran sets what is left of her pomegranate on the railing, easing over the side and back down to street level. With any luck, given the number of guards and their usual patterns of laziness when their employers are away, she will be back to finish it before the moon is up.

Fran's ears are quite good, but every sound still echoes off the streets and again off the walls, and even in the mostly quiet, empty street she is on the din of all Bhujerba is a low roar, like the scouring of some distant sea - which means she does not hear the sound of light footsteps until after they have left the rooftop across from where she stands. A sudden, half-swallowed shout and the sound of rippling fabric, and the woman lands squarely on top of her.

A waterfall of silk and flailing limbs. After a moment, Fran manages to get her hands steady on the ground, pushing back and away, catching a glimpse of bright eyes just briefly, beneath a veil of cloth.

"Hello, there!"

A rather deep voice for a hume woman, and the scent that assaults her nose is anything but female, even half-buried as it is beneath a wave of rose perfume. The man finally emerges from the cocoon of his skirts, with an expression altogether too merry and confident for the way his undergarments threaten to ride up around his ears.

"I always _was_ a bit better at getting these things undone." He says in a smooth, warm voice, only to fiddle uselessly with the bodice for another moment, before slicing the laces instead, cutting the ruffled fabric off his shoulders and stepping up and out of the ruined dress. At least, thank the gods, he is wearing pants.

Fran has already found her feet when he looks at her again, and she expects the open, half-awed stare most hume males care to favor her with - but his is not quite the same, since there is not a hint of shame to be found in it. Fully aware she knows that he is staring, and why, and therefore taking his time to appreciate her properly. He's also bleeding, a scratch just below his hairline, though he doesn't seem to notice.

"I believe you require… aid." Or perhaps an Esuna. Or to be tossed off another roof.

He waves the thought away like an annoying bug, dusting his bare chest off as if smoothing wrinkles from a fine shirt. Muscular, but not overly so. A thin scar runs along the length of his collarbone, another pale mark, star-shaped along his side. "Don't trouble yourself. A head injury adds a bit of fun to our first encounter, don't you think?"

"I see him! There he is!" A bangaa's roar, several rooftops away, and Fran can hear the heavy tread of further pursuit, angry voices echoing down to where they are. It is no surprise, to see the man's head jerk in the direction of the loudest cry. "Get him!"

"He's got an accomplice!"

"Balthier, you shit! We're going to string you up by your balls and sink you into the sandsea!"

"My cue." He says, _sotto voce_, and grins at her again. Or has simply not stopped grinning all this time. "If you're looking for the Viscount's precious treasure, I'm afraid I've already stolen it." He shakes a loosly wrapped bundle in his other hand, a glint of crystal visible inside. "However, you are welcome to take part in the daring escape."

As if there is a choice. Fran glares, but it is only at the back of the man's head - he is already up and running, and as a bullet pings against the tiles to her left, it seems but prudent to follow. Quick on his feet, for a hume, though if this is his usual escape plan Fran can see the need for such swiftness. The man nimbly makes his way over walls and across rooftops, skidding to a sudden stop at the end of the last of these, overlooking a wide plaza with no particularly good exit points and what seem to be a number of city guards who are but moments away from noticing them. A fast glance left and right that suggests he is only now considering his next move, that perhaps what she took for decisiveness and preparation was simply random desperation. All of Fran's exit strategies involved taking a right three corners back - she had trusted this man, though at the moment she cannot imagine why. Perhaps she is the one who needs the Esuna.

"Ha!"

This man, this Balthier sounds pleased, though Fran sees no reason for it, nor moments later as she follows him, halting at the corner of the roof while he leaps off without hesitation, as if expecting to grow wings halfway down. He lands straddling a small skycraft - Fran is familiar with them at a distance, though she has not seen the need to try one for herself - not until now, it seems. The movements he makes are deft and sure, the crack of metal giving way beneath a tool that flicks in and out of his hand - what she will learn is a rather brute force method, only for times of great duress. It takes but a moment, no one yet noticing as the engine whines softly and it lifts from the ground. Three bangaa skid into view on the other end of the pavilion, shouting for Balthier's blood and other vital organs. This attracts the attention of the city guard, as well as a man who instantly draws his sword when he sees his vessel so commandeered.

It is a glimpse of the future in all its glory, though Fran does not know that yet, her only thought at the moment that this Balthier is secure in his escape and she has nothing to tempt him with. Almost before she has finished thinking it, he has brought the ship up and wheeled it around, looking at her in expectation. It had never even crossed his mind to leave her behind. Fran leaps on, only to let out a surprised little sound as the machine lurches into life, one arm around his chest and she feels him flinch where her claws dig in, yet he hasn't slowed down, the cries of outrage fading as the bike screams through the streets. It is nearly night now, the lights on the streets flashing by, not nearly enough to illuminate the paths in front of them. Fran thinks that she can see better than this hume possibly can, and they are _still_ going too fast for her, faster than she has ever moved in the whole of her life. Screams ahead, angry shouts as Balthier nearly topples a cart while running over its owner, the chaos almost instantly behind them, disappearing into the dark.

A sudden flash, a burst of fire that makes the whole craft shudder, and she turns to see they are indeed being pursued. Three ships similar to the one they ride, at least one of the passengers casting spells, flashes of lightning crackling through the air, exploding just in front of them though it does not seem to bother Balthier at all. Fran hears him laugh a little under his breath, and though the bright flares have done their best to blind her he is quite happy to fly on instinct, with any lack of crashing seeming entirely coincidental. At the moment, Fran half wishes she were a hume herself, that it would be enough to close her eyes and not feel the tiny craft wobble beneath her, the hot spark of its pulsing heart. How close the walls loom, a matter of mere inches as Balthier pushes into the turns, sharp and fast enough to send her stomach right up into her throat.

It is a merry chase, Balthier roaring down the narrow spaces between buildings, threading up and under rows of bridges without any hesitation - if he has touched the brakes once, she has not felt it. At any moment Fran expects to hear the sound of a terrible crash past the roar of the wind in her ears, yet it seems Balthier is winning the pure battle of nerves, at least one of the ships deciding his capture is not worth the risk of near-certain destruction. The second falls behind as he pushes the bike even faster along a wide, empty plain with the moon tracing a silver path, Bhujerba stretching off to their right and a high-pitched whine from the engine that Fran cannot imagine is anything good.

It is just about the time that Fran realizes where they are, the emptiness around them due to the fact that this edge of the island is not at all stable or solid - in some places little more than floating gravel - that Balthier shuts off the few lights they do have, and kills the engine, braking hard. It sweeps the back of the bike out in a long arc, and she does not look down, does not think about the way the ship's magicite is not enough to keep them from falling, should they tumble off the edge of Bhujerba itself, sliding out into open air. A moment later, and he's got them tucked in the shadows of a jutting spar of rock, the last of their pursuit roaring past. Fran feels as if her wits have been left well behind, too slow to keep up, her heart thudding in her chest, a tingling across her skin, all the way down to her fingertips - and Balthier is surely bleeding from where she'd dug her claws into him, though he says nothing, flashing her a moonlit grin over one shoulder. The third ship reappears, moving more slowly, and though the guard comes close to their hiding place it is clear they have lost the scent, and they do not linger.

"I wish I'd stolen that ship." Balthier says in the quiet that follows. "It has a far better engine."

Fran does not trust her voice enough to reply, not that she would know what to say.

The trip back is at a far more restrained pace, and by the time they arrive at a small, secluded grotto things have been silent for long enough that Fran can remember this is the way it ought to be, on those days her quests are not hijacked by madmen. Balthier leans back from where he has been curled over the controls - they are hovering over a small pond, with a large estate in the middle distance, nothing but the wind to be heard. The stars wheel brilliantly overhead.

"Well, now that we have a fitting place to do this properly - my name is Balthier." The hume says into the silence, though Fran has heard enough people shouting it in the last quarter-hour to at least be sure of that. "Pirate king of the Strahl. Adventurer, rogue, and finest pilot in all Ivalice. You are?"

"Unimpressed." No reason to waste the Esuna, his condition obviously incurable, unless she wishes to club him with the bottle.

"Tis an amazingly common name, that." He settles himself with a bit more deliberation, regarding her, and she has the sudden, terrible suspicion this pretty garden is no accidental choice. "Forgive me for my low manners, but I would be blind not to point out that you are the most exceptionally b-"

Fran takes the spear from his hand and shoves him off the bike in what is all but the same motion, hearing the splash as he hits the pond. Floating well out of his reach, and she has plenty of time to slide into the driver's seat. Even in the midst of the chaos she'd felt the way he'd moved, pushing his foot forward to urge the machine into motion, leaning his heel down to slow it - not that there was much of that - and as she leans it bends with her, a smooth, slow arc that reveals Balthier in the water below. She had thought he would be furious, splashing and shouting, yet the only sound comes from a few frogs trilling at the water's edge. A remarkable equanimity for a hume, if he is _not_, indeed, as mad as a frothing chocobo. Floating placidly on his back, gazing up at her amidst a field of white water lilies,with a rapt, entirely affected adoration that makes her want to drop a rock on him.

"The throttle is the one on your right. Take care not to overclock her."

Fran's ears are more than good enough to hear him over the sound of the engine rising to her command. Balthier is laughing.

* * *

Coincidence is another word that means little to the viera, all things connected in one way or another, even if it may not seem clear at the time. Fortunately, despite their sudden partnership, her name does not become linked to the 'notorious' sky pirate Balthier, and she is free to continue in Bhujerba as she pleases. The spear goes back to Eryut, via a trustworthy chain of Moogle connections. It is not penance, or an attempt to connect to what she knows has been rent asunder - it is simply what is right.

Of the pirate, Fran intends only to whet a vague curiosity, and make a few discreet inquiries, though it soon becomes clear this is not a word one can justify when speaking of the man. It is also of note, though perhaps not so surprising, how many of those she asks instantly believe she is a jilted lover, or attempting to collect on a debt. Or both. For every one of the bounties concerning his capture, she is offered several smaller sums to simply administer a good, thorough beating. Twenty gil for one good, swift kick, from a girl who refuses to take no for an answer, or provide her name. "Oh, he'll know," is all she will say.

His name truly is Balthier, and he is in turns an idiot, a showman, a thief, a bastard, a hopeless romantic, the luckiest man in Ivalice and simply too stupid to die. Affecting a gentleman's air and a lunatic's bravado, he seems to have a rather suicidal penchant for going after Archadian ships and their valuable cargo. The more Fran learns, the more it seems the bounty on his head would be far less high were he not so interested in theatrics, mocking both the Rozarrian magistrates and the Archadian Judges with daringly ridiculous, utterly impractical stunts that are, to a surprising degree, stunningly successful. One of the more common stories details how he had taken possession of an entire docking bay's worth of spoils from the Alexander herself, including six cases of aged rum, four crates of newly minted rifles and - this part always saved for last - Judge Magister Zargabaath's toothbrush, lifted directly from his private quarters.

Fran had met Balthier for little more than a handful of moments, but if there is any truth in the tale, she is willing to wager it on the last. A few months pass, and though she hears a few rumors, now that she knows to listen, their paths do not cross again. It means her work is quiet and profitable and there is no mention of a quick-fingered viera in any city's report. The few thieves there are at her level seem to each prefer a calling card, a way to mark their conquests, though Fran lacks a message to leave behind, or anyone she would wish to take note.

So it is simply another job, working at dusk, and she nimbly works her claws into the masonry of a somewhat small but pretty estate in Balfonheim, with what ought to be a rather valuable diadem in a small study on the third floor, and Fran is as silent as air and unnoticed as a shadow, slipping up the side of the wall and in through an open window - to where Balthier has just snuck in through the outer door, closing it silently behind him. They stare at each other - at least his surprise seems as real as her own, and then he lights up, as if they are visitors to the same party who have just happened to cross paths.

"Fran," he says, with the same bright, shameless smile, "your name, is it not? I made a few inquiries."

The wardrobe stands slightly to his left, full of fancy gowns and tall enough to admit an average-sized hume, and really it takes little effort on her part to kick him into it and lock the door before turning back to her prize, the small chest nestled amidst a few other treasures on the far table. Fran has not yet reached it when she hears the sound of muffled thumping behind her, though both past experience and tales told suggest Balthier has had plenty of experience untangling himself from women's clothing.

"You have admirable reflexes, Fran. May I call you Fran? It seems but fair as you know my name and I am locked in a closet."

His tone is pleasant, conversational. He will ask her about the weather next.

Little surprise the box has not been well hidden, with the wealth of enchantments enscrolled around it. Fran lets out a slow breath, hands hovering just above its surface. Intricate magicks protect the contents, but she has studied these, and there are instincts of the viera that serve rather well for such moments. It sounds as if Balthier has managed to wedge a knife in between the crack of the door and the frame, attempting to lift up the pins that hold the hinges in place.

"Was that your first time aloft? I had heard the viera are not much for such pursuits, and yet you rode like you were born to it. Some think it is easy, simply being a passenger, but if you don't lean into the turns at the proper time, it can throw the whole balance off. It requires delicacy, and trust."

Wind-touched, another word for those who fly higher than they ought, and faster than most would dare, beloved by the capricious, careless spirits of the air. Many in Ivalice follow the same god, and look to Bur-Omisace for their guidance, but there are a thousand other gods and demons twined within and among this world, and those who cannot help but belong first and only to the sky.

A few more careful passes, whispered words, Fran feeling the magicks retreat from the chest like unknotted cords, and then it its but a box, though there is still the matter of a rather substantial lock. Fran slips a lockpick from its usual hiding place in her hair, and hears a ping from behind her, one of the pins falling free from the door.

"Since we have this moment together, I would like to make an offer. Your help, in attaining a particular treasure I have been pursuing. Certainly not the easiest of marks, but I could make it worth your while, regardless of the outcome. You have quite the compliment of skills and," even through the door, with her back to it, Fran thinks he can sense her skeptical expression. "Did I mention I have an airship?"

All the stories she's heard suggest he _does_ have some sort of ship, even if it seems the most unlikely of all possibilities. Fran's ear twitches, some combination of listening and feeling the small vibrations along her fingertips as she attempts to trick the mechanism. It would surely be disaster, to ally with such a hume.

"You're picking the lock, aren't you?"

Fran ought to know better. But if she had, would she not still be in Eryut?

"It would probably help if I were quiet."

A few moments later, and she hears the lock snap open. Balthier seems to be having more difficulty freeing the lower pin, his voice still muffled through the door as she opens the lid on the box.

"What's it look like? Describe it for me."

Fran does not have the words. Which is rather like telling the truth, as the box is empty.

A veritable army rushes the door a few moments later, spilling into the room just as Balthier gets the door free from its last hinge, the weight ripping the lock away, falling with a dramatic clatter in what is now an otherwise silent room. Fran can tell from the looks on their faces, they already know Balthier - she would believe it entirely possible he both knows and has managed to anger every single fellow criminal in Ivalice, from two-gil cons to the leaders of entire armies of angry thugs, such as these. Everyone stares at each other, and the box, and at each other once more. Fran, not surprisingly, endures a few extra contemplative stares.

Still perched inside the wardrobe, Balthier lifts his hands in a mild shrug.

"Well, obviously we're quite innocent."

The spokesperson for the group - a hume - steps forward. His smile is much less charming.

"Well, obviously we don't care."

The brawling starts a few moments later.

* * *

"If you examine it in a certain light, this is actually a stroke of luck. We shall have ample opportunity to see how well we work together."

If Fran were in a position other than tied back-to-back with a lunatic, being lowered into a subterranean cave with no means of escape save through a group of thieves twice as dangerous as the ones currently sending them to their doom, she would feed Balthier his left boot. It had been an embarrassing fight, too many opponents and too little space and when they'd finally gotten a knife to Balthier's throat Fran had relented, dropping the blade that was now in their care, along with her quiver and bow. One of the humes had made to 'check' her for more weapons, but she'd only smiled, baring her teeth just a little, keeping her eyes fixed with his until he'd decided he had elsewhere to be.

It is still unclear to her, if the empty box had been ever intended as bait, or if it is but happy circumstance, that the thieves who'd stumbled upon them as they were stealing what had already been stolen knew where it might be found. Quite possible that one has nothing to do with the other at all. Calling their captors slapdash idea a 'plan' would be giving it far too much credit. The cave they are being lowered into rests on a secluded bit of seashore, with an entrance - and a good deal of the cave itself - set to disappear completely at high tide. A gang of well-armed thieves occupies what remains of the area, directly between the exit and where they're being lowered. The idea is for them to sneak up on these men, steal back the diadem and escape - if only then to be killed by the men who've sent them on this little errand.

Of course, getting murdered by the thieves in the cave - who also, unsurprisingly, know of Balthier and have a score to settle - seems perfectly acceptable to their captors, along with drowning or being crushed by loose rocks or any other ignoble death they might chance to stumble over. Fran grimaces, chill saltwater sweeping over the tops of her boots as her feet touch the cave floor, claws instantly working on the ropes that bind them. She's freed herself and Balthier before they've let go of the rope from above, and she steps back as a the light glints off a falling weapon that lands with a clatter, joined after a moment by another. Two short swords of barely adequate make, nothing close to the quality of weapons they'd had taken from them. She can see Balthier make an annoyed grimace as he gives his blade a cursory swing, though his expression improves when he sees her watching.

"It's not really a proper adventure until something goes wrong. Now that we've got that out of the way, everything ought to work in our favor, don't you think?"

What gods has he bribed, and _how_, to live this long?

Finding the target is easy, the thieves camp set up on a high plateau, rough canvas tents surrounded by torchlight. Fran can hear the roar of the open ocean past that, the cry of the gulls from the mouth of the cave, down the other side of the hill, and the only way out. Fran is a creature of trees and grass and a cool, green world. The rough stone of this place is barren and lifeless, the echoes of surf and the conversation of the men that fill the dark space already threaten to give her a headache. It does not help that Balthier keeps looking toward the ceiling in a disturbingly calculating sort of way.

"How well do you swim?" He glances over, when she does not reply. "If we wait to do this when the tide is in - well, assuming we aren't dashed to bits by rocks or drowned by riptides or shot full of arrows first - it would solve the problem of the men waiting outside the cave, I imagine. Perhaps."

"You are optimistic."

"It's the only way we humes get anything accomplished." Balthier says, and steps backward, out of the very edge of the torchlight and away from what are, as it stands, rather impossible odds. Fran follows, for the lack of a better idea, and once they are out of view and moving back through the dark, sodden catacombs, he snaps his fingers, conjuring a small flame to light the way. It is surprising, a more delicate, demanding spell than she would expect such a man capable of. The cave is surprisingly deep, the sound of water everywhere, no longer just the tide but dripping down from a thousand hidden chambers. All of the path they are walking rests well below the dark tide line on the wall, and the sting of salt from brackish pools of water burns at her nose.

"Ah, there we are. I had wondered why they would make such a place their warren."

The end of the cavern reveals a massive stone door, easily twice Fran's height, and decorated with complex runes all along its border. Along its surface lies the image of a woman with four arms poised around her. A goddess, riding the back of a coiled sea serpent, her head turned in profile and her hair wild as she blows on a conch shell, perhaps summoning the winds that swirl around her. Pieces of the door have obviously been blasted away by magic, chips of stone where prybars have been set, but it is clear they've had little luck forcing their way inside. Balthier shakes his head, makes a chastising sound under his breath as he runs his free hand over a set of symbols on one side of the door, studying them carefully.

"Illiterate, unmannerly cutpurses, the lot of them. No appreciation for history."

"Unlike you, of course."

"Of course." Balthier smiles. "I am a gentleman adventurer."

"Such a distinction?" Fran says dryly.

"Generally," he replies, and leans in close, rising up on his toes to whisper something in the stone ear of the door's guardian, and steps away at a soft grinding sound, the entire slab sliding free. Balthier turns to her, badly concealing a proud smirk as he gestures her inside with an exaggerated flourish, "it opens doors."

Fran does not shove him into the wall as she walks by, though it takes a healthy restraint.

As little as she has enjoyed this unexpected detour, there is no denying the antechamber is beautiful, unlike anything she has ever seen. Great care has gone into its construction - it would appear the door had also kept out the sea, the floor and walls dry - high columns carved from the stones towering over them along the right wall, the entire floor tiled in pearlescent stone that seems to glow beneath drifts of pale sand. It was surely important, once, this place, painted frescoes still carrying some hint of ancient color, describing a great battle of the sea, though most of the detail seems to be on what coils and swirls beneath the waves, great many-armed beasts as large or larger than the ships above, enormous schools of fish and what even seem to be whole, multicolored forests, rising up from the ocean's floor.

Fran hears a wet crunch, turns to see Balthier grimace, wiping his boot against a stone. He has crushed a crab, nearly the same color as the stones, and as she looks over the ground Fran can see a considerable number more coming up out of the sand, perhaps roused by their footsteps, a few quickly gathering to make a meal of their fallen kin.

The statue that stands at the center of the room is either sister or aspect to the woman on the stone door, with her many arms raised high, her body twisted at the waist into that of a sleek fish. She is illuminated by a single shaft of sunlight, spilling down into the very center of the room, bright enough that Balthier has extinguished his own flame. Fran looks up, though it seems little more than a narrow crack in the ceiling, hardly a chance they could climb out even with a proper rope. The light does, however, illuminate the pearls around the throat of the statue, an ornate garland studded here and there with sapphires that match the bracelets around its wrists. Balthier has taken note of them, but she is curious to find that he kneels instead at the base of the statue, carefully withdrawing a scroll, inset into the stone. He unwraps it with surprising care, just enough for a glimpse at the contents before just as cautiously rolling it back up.

"If you'd care to make use of me," he says, without looking up. "Such beauty has no more business being here than you do."

Fran rolls her eyes at the cursory flirtation, but he does not waver as she steps up onto his shoulders, swiftly transferring the adornments from the statue's neck and arms to her own, listening to Balthier curse slightly as one of the more adventurous crabs decides to take particular offense to his fingers.

"Well," he says as she returns to earth, his eyes once again looking her over, along with the priceless treasures she now wears. So utterly without guile, and entirely incorrigible at the same time, that Fran nearly smiles back, "that does take care of the business of making this profitable. Now we just need a distraction."

Despite the endless echoes tricking her ears, Fran still hears it coming, feels the approach, her hand around Balthier's arm and pulling him toward the door. At the last moment, she realizes that the other crabs are scattering as well - fleeing, as the sandy floor explodes upward, a massive claw and a burst of blue fire instantly melting the stone statue into bright drops that hiss against the floor. The crab bears some resemblance to its kin, though it stands nearly the size of the room - and with a single sweep of its claw and an earthshaking roar, breaks through the wall to the cavern beyond.

"Did I mention I've always been lucky?" Balthier says, and then they are sprinting back across the cavern, with the creature right at their heels.

In a way, it is rather easy to rush a band of hostile bandits when being chased by an enormous, acid-breathing crab. The man closest to them as they take the summit doesn't have time to do more than open his mouth to shout before Fran kicks him, hard, relieving him of his pistol and taking swift, careful aim at a bangaa at the other side of camp, catching him in the shoulder. The report from the gunfire gives them away but by then the crab has arrived, hooking one giant pincher over the lip of the embankment to pull itself up, and the thieves are shrieking, darting here and there to find weapons or flee for their lives. A few flashes of weak magic splash against the creature's armored hide, doing no damage. Fran glances back, but Balthier is no longer behind her, and she can see no sign of him amidst the chaos. A kicked-over lantern quickly ignites the cloth of a tent, and the fire spreads swiftly, shouts of alarm mixing with those of pain, a hume screaming as another burst of the crab's breath takes his arm to bone at the elbow. By then, Fran is sprinting along the edge of the camp, skidding down the far side and toward the cave's entrance.

The tide is not yet in, and she is not surprised to see men rushing up - their first set of captors, alerted by the chaos, but Fran is in no mood to be taken lightly and there is room here for a proper brawl. She brings her elbow up with crushing force against the jaw of the bangaa in the lead, spinning him around to take the crossbow bolt meant for her. A sliver of her attention is still taken with searching for Balthier, that perhaps the silly hume had beaten her here - but there is no sign of him, and Fran's heart sinks. Large hands grab her from behind, and she snaps her head back, hears a crunch and a scream as her helm breaks his nose, and a second punch sends him to the ground. By this time more of the fleeing thieves have arrived, a bloody free-for all at the mouth of the cave, Fran snatching weapons in one breath to kick their owners back into the mob with the next. At least the monstrous crab seems slowed somewhat by the fire, rising up above the flaming ruin of the thieves camp like some grotesque shadow play. Fran is quite pleased, as she sends her next assailant to the sand, to realize the sword she has taken up is her own.

A blade hisses through the air, and Fran leans back, dodging the strike as she turns, driving a hard punch to the ribs of the man who'd intended to take her head, hearing the crack of bone as he falls. All too late Fran sees the bangaa with a crossbow near the mouth of the cave, his bolt aimed straight at her and there is no time to move or duck and Fran thinks of the Wood, of Jote and Mjrn and the green-

The crack of the pistol shot is loud, close at it is, the bolt going wide as the bangaa falls. Fran turns to find Balthier beside her with a smile on his face, the diadem crooked on his head, and she has no doubt he says something he believes to be terribly clever, but the sound is entirely drowned out by another roar from the crab now lumbering down the slope toward them. When he moves toward the entrance she follows, pausing only long enough to snatch her bow away from another set of undeserving hands, slamming him in the face with the grip.

It is not as surprising as it should be to reach sunlight, and see the ship swooping down toward them, Balthier leaping for the side hatch as it opens, reaching a hand out for her. As she reaches back, Fran hears the rumble behind her. Can see it in Balthier's eyes, that he's watching the crab burst out of the mouth of the cave and into the sea as her hand closes around his and he pulls her up into the ship. The door lifts up behind them as the airship turns sharply, skimming the surface of the waves and swiftly gaining altitude. Within moments, they are soaring through peaceful skies.

"Kupo?"

"Never better." Balthier says, gulping for air as he reaches the top of the stairs, collapsing in an utterly undignified heap. Fran sits down with only slightly more grace beside him, head against her knees, breathing a bit hard and, she thinks, letting her fingers trail along a strand of sapphires, likely wearing more in jewels now than her last ten jobs combined. She glances over at a slight sound, two moogles peering out at her curiously from the cockpit.

"Well then," Balthier says, looking up at her with a satisfied smile, just as he had on Bhujerba, but with the laughter now dancing in his eyes, "welcome aboard."

* * *

Author's Notes:

1. Yes, that giant crab is the cousin of the one from 'Vagrant Story'.

2. The soundtrack to most of this chapter is definitely Sweet's 'Ballroom Blitz'


	17. a kind of integrity 2

The Strahl is very well appointed, a vessel intended to quarter eight in battle proves quite suitable for a hume, a viera and four moogles as a casual affair. The skyguilds of the moogles are not defined by the boundaries of hume politics, and though they hailed from Archadia, where the ship was apparently stolen, there is little concern of any criminality by association, not for such engineers. All of Balthier's crew are journeymen bachelors, and apparently it matters little what ship they get their training aboard. Fran does not know the particulars, perhaps there is even greater value in being the crew of a one-of-a kind 'liberated' pirate vessel. Balthier has no other crew - a little odd, perhaps, considering his nature. Difficult to play to the crowd when there is no crowd.

It is far from the first contradiction, the suggestion that Balthier is far more than the sum of stories told. All but from the first he defies her expectations, a room fit and ready for her before Fran has finished washing the sea salt from her fur, and Balthier does not speak of payment, nor the slightest hint that she ought join him in his room instead. Only that she may consider the Strahl her home, for as long as she has need of it, and then he leaves her alone. For all his talk of requiring her aid, Balthier seems to have no particular mission in mind, or perhaps is as yet unsure of her loyalty, though he was well content to let her fence the baubles she takes from the cave, and did not question the profits she brings back - he'd given her the diadem to do the same, her beauty likely to gain the higher price.

Odd, the matter-of-fact way he'd said it, and when she'd looked at him expecting the same coy flirtation as ever, there had been no sign. He is unerringly polite, and the longer Fran stays aboard the ship, the more Balthier treats her as a partner, with the same respect and courtesy as the moogles and no sign he had ever thought of her in any other way. He always lets her know when he is going out, where he thinks he will dock next and when he plans to move on, but when they are not working together she is free to do as she will. Even in such close quarters, there is never a question of privacy - he neither asks of her business, nor expects her to tell him.

A fool in public, then, and a gentleman where there is no one to see? Hardly what Fran knows of humes and their usual behavior.

The Strahl is a comfortable ship, and Balthier is quite well connected, as any man with his reputation would have to be, but it is the mystery of him, the unending differences between what he ought to be and what he is that keep her aboard. Balthier, who does not hesitate to give her the bounty of a successful day's work to divy up, who will risk his neck for the prize without thinking only to hand it off to her without counting. A hume in this rough business who keeps an eye out for scrolls and magicks no matter the price they might fetch. Seemingly interested in any and all rare spellcraft, and he knows a considerable number of specialists in the magickal antiquities, certainly more than any pirate would find necessary simply to offload pilfered artifacts.

Hardly so large a ship, that he could hide himself from her so completely, even if he intended to try. Fran will not intrude, does not seek him out in his room or demand answers from the moogle crew or even pose the odd, leading question, but she can be very patient. Possessed of skills that have allowed her to stalk game silently for miles, never-seen, and she thinks this will not require measures nearly so great. A matter simply of paying attention, of quietly gathering up moments; the way that all that is told of the pirate still leaves an outline, for the true Balthier to fit inside.

* * *

Life may be a stage, as Balthier is all too often happy to remind her, and their actions part of some never-ending play, but Fran still questions the facility of an intermission that finds them both wedged into a space barely suitable for one. The hume is all but sitting in her lap, attempting to study a map by the light coming through the cracks in the dumbwaiter, while she uses all of her strength to hold the rope up and keep them from plummeting back down the shaft.

For the record, this was not part of the plan.

"Nothing ever really goes right when I'm in lace stockings," Balthier murmurs thoughtfully. He still is in them, mostly because the laced-up boots he is also wearing go practically to the knee, with heels in fair competition for her own, the left one currently jabbing rather irritatingly into her right thigh. At least they have managed to ditch the dress. It was hardly his color. "It went well enough in petticoats that one time, but the stockings are always tricky…"

"Balthier. The map."

"Yes, of course. It appears that we need to go… up, one more floor. I do apologize."

Fran bites down on any curses, saving the energy for pulling on the rope as quietly as possible. Balthier assists her with this as best he can, and if she should slap him in the face with her ears now and then, well, it is a very small compartment.

"Here we are then. Now just to… oh." As if it is a surprise to anyone, when the door is locked from the outside. Fran's eyes narrow, trying to calculate the proper angle and how they will have to be positioned, so that she might kick it in. It will no doubt alert anyone with working ears, but at this point Fran would rather fight every single person in the city than stay five more minutes with Balthier's armpit wedged under her kneecap. It is clear that even in this dim light, he can see what she's thinking.

"I will point out that for that to work, you'll have to kick _through_ me."

"Nothing that won't heal." Fran says, even though she's already discarded the plan, just to see him pout. It is more amusing than she thought it would be, teasing this hume, even if both her arms are burning from the strain of holding the rope. Her ears twitch at the sound of footsteps - light, with just the slight scraping of claws. _Moogle_, she mouths to Balthier, who shrugs and asks the question with his eyes and Fran shrugs back, as they are rather low on better ideas.

"Excuse me," Balthier says politely, and the footsteps stop in front of the door. No immediate response, but ever the optimist, he pushes boldly forward. "I don't suppose you might give us a hand."

If the moogle were unaware of what they were doing, or aware and inclined to stop them, surely there would be screaming and cursing and Fran trying not to give herself rope burn as they plummeted down the shaft. She is bracing herself for just such a future when the soft voice finally speaks.

"Payment in advance, kupo." Amazing, how they can make the common word into a rather expansive insult, when the mood strikes.

"I see you've heard of me." Balthier says, sliding gil as quickly as he can, one-by-one through the cracks. Fortunately, there is only so much time a servant can dare to stand around in front of a magical coin-granting door, and they are lucky enough that the moogle is dishonest enough to take their money and yet honest enough to flip the latch, and within moments they are standing in the hall, and at least from the waist up two-thirds of them appear to be competent in some form of thievery. Not that' Balthier's undergarments aren't oddly flattering - he is a creature made up of equal parts overconfidence and leg muscles, the latter as insurance for when the former gets him into trouble.

"… can't _walk_ in these blasted things." Balthier mutters softly, Fran ignoring him as they continue down the silent hall. Sky piracy is without the same exacting rules as other forms of enterprise, a rather patchwork nature to the way they must keep themselves occupied and the ship aloft. It is, in part, a spite-based industry, and there is a certain niche market for the wealthy to enlist their aid in enacting all kinds of punishments on each other. Lovers against lovers, former wives against former husbands or simply, in this case, two rich men with too much money who wish to irritate each other with petty humiliations. For the coin and the challenge, Balthier has liberated incriminating letters, pilfered trinkets of sentimental value and in some cases has stolen an item only to steal it back again, just as happy to be hired by the target as by his former employer. An absurd business, truly, but it pays well, with no rules against lifting whatever else might catch their eye along the way to their prize.

Not that Fran thinks there will be much of that tonight, even if half the room were melted down into a less ridiculous shape. Their target obviously fancies himself master of the hunt, as evidenced by the many guns and swords lining the walls, and even more so the stuffed and mounted menagerie that covers the walls, spilling down across the floor. A bestiary of Ivalice's dangerous creatures spread out before them, frozen in positions far more impressive than those Fran would guess they had died in. A charybterix with its wings spread wide, poised as if preparing to swoop down on a coeurl, the beast twisting, reared on its hind legs which are braced on a covering of what appears to be crocodile skin, which would not seem quite so extreme were it not for the rug made of wyrdhare pelts that covers much of the rest of the room.

"… and there are those who say the rich have no sense of humor." Balthier says, eyes sweeping quickly over all the gilding, feathers and fur, alighting finally on the prize, resting on a high shelf inset in the wall. It is a cup - a stein, Balthier specified - for the tricentennial celebration of the founding of the Republic of Archadia, an event that had taken place only a handful of years before. It is not such a strange custom, in the Wood they do craft special tokens for certain festival days, but Fran cannot help but stare as Balthier brings it down into the light, not quite certain she has ever seen anything so… so…

"Gods save them, it's exactly as hideous as I remember." His voice carries a sort of respectful awe, holding the oversized mug gingerly, as if afraid the ugliness might leak on him. It gleams prettily enough, but the patterns and reliefs engraved in its surface seem awkwardly done at best - flowers with wilted, misshapen petals, figures with oddly melted features and limbs that curve at odd angles. All with the expressions of oddly-resigned madmen, though Fran can imagine there would be nothing but an attempt to make the best of it, in a world with trees burnished to misshapen blobs under an equally warped sun that may be a moon or perhaps some kind of low-orbiting livestock.

"You have… seen this before?"

"Not the first one I've stolen." Balthier laughs at her expression. "Indeed, they made _hundreds_ of these things. The real irony is, I believe… ah, yes," Balthier shakes the grotesque stein, testing its heft, "silver-plated only. Archadia to its core - all show, little substance and even less value." He continues to tilt it this way and that, obviously searching for any hint that it is less than wholly offensive, and finding little argument. "This is a horror from every possible angle."

Fran turns away, to look for anything else that might make this worth the effort, listening to Balthier still chatting to himself, studying his prize.

"What on earth is that chocobo doing… well, _someone's_ got an imagination."

It seems already to be courting ill fortune, to take anything with her from such a place, and a quick survey of the weapons does not improve Fran's view - all the swords are ornamental only, overdecorated and therefore valuable, but useless in a way that sets her fur up. No smell of gun oil on any of the pistols or rifles, the odds are they have never been fired - which makes her wonder just who brought in the beasts that surround them, the wyvern coiled and snarling at her with its bright, false eyes. One thing to be a rich man, to display the spoils of one's own victory, the pelts of what has been hunted fair, but this is simply absurd, in a way that borders on personal insult.

"Fran, I think I may have gone blind."

Balthier has the lid open, staring into the stein with dismay, but snaps it quickly closed at the sound of voices from the other side of the room, the soft sound of a knob being turned, only the barest of warnings before the door swings open. Fortunately, in such a room as this there are any number of places to hide, and they each duck into an alcove, Balthier tucked behind a pillar, Fran stepping behind some enormous, armored creature she cannot put a name to. The two of them stand on either side of a glass door, a balcony that would have been their escape route, and still might be of use. If she leans back, there is a sliver of space where she can see Balthier, and it is no surprise that he looks all but giddy at the sudden prospect of being found out. As much as he may complain about the risks of the job - mostly to those who might raise the reward a few gil for the embellishment - no one becomes a sky pirate to avoid danger.

"-can't trust it. The private companies might not be able to compete on the same level, but you don't have to beg for their damn attention, and it's a _hell_ of a lot easier to go back on a deal with the worst of them than to break contract with House bloody Solidor."

Fran risks peeking out from behind her perch, just for a glance. The humes are perhaps at middle age, one of them balding, the other with a thick beard. Nothing of particular interest in either of them, neither with the obvious trademarks of absurdity the room would seem to demand, that she had to admit she was looking for. Fran knows the name Solidor - the Emperor, the leader of the Archadians, though how a single man can lead so many in any real way has never made sense to her. In the Wood, the village leader could speak with anyone, at any time. Fran knew the names of everyone in Eryut, and would see each of them several times through the day. It seems impossible that a man might lead those he does not know and cannot name, that anyone who could not speak directly to their leader would still have reason to listen to him, yet it is this way all throughout Ivalice.

"Make any argument you want, but the fact is the Draklor Laboratories get results, regardless of _how_ they get them, and I'm not going to wait for the price on those engines to double before I lock in. Who knows, we might see a bid on open market Nethicite in our lifetime. Every man from here to Rozarria is falling all over themselves for a piece of that rock they've dreamed up, when half of them aren't even sure it's real."

"Are you so certain it is?"

"You saw them test the Shiva, same as I did. Just imagine it, to never risk losing another cargo to some unexpected sinkhole? No more ships scuttled by the Jagd, no more pirates knocking them into dead sky to collect the cargo? Hell, you could save enough in insurance to cover whatever they might charge."

Fran leans back, shifting out of sight as the man moves down the aisle between their hiding places and - fortune is with them - opens the doors onto the balcony, and the free night air. He has not yet noticed his missing treasure, though with so many gaudy ornaments as distraction, it is not all that surprising, and their luck may yet hold. She hears the creak of what might be a cabinet door from the other side of the room, and has to fight not to grind her teeth. If they should start up drinking, she and Balthier might be left with little to do but stand here for the rest of the night.

"If the Nethicite ever goes public, which it won't. You forget that Draklor serves the military first, and Vayne Solidor above that, and _he's_ nothing but a bastard's bastard with a pet lunatic on a leash."

The man who'd opened the doors laughs, she can hear him turning away from the night, moving back into the room, and Fran risks another glimpse - his friend is sitting against the desk with his back to them, and if it were her alone she might take the chance. A dozen silent steps would have her to the edge of the balcony, up and over and out of sight before they could even turn around. Balthier is not so much less nimble than she, that it could not be done - and she shifts back slightly to see if he's already had the same idea.

Except that Balthier is not looking at her, or even at the door, swiftly calculating a way out and how to compensate for a lack of claws. He is staring straight ahead, as if he can see right through the pillar in front of him, to where the men are sitting, and his expression - she has never seen that look on his face before. No hint of excitement, none of his usual coiled potential, a bird poised to leap back into the air. It is not Balthier, not with this bleak, resigned _trapped_ look about him, and for a moment Fran glances around wildly for whatever terrible danger she has missed. He has faced down circumstances far worse than this with a smile - but there is nothing she can see. Nothing that should turn him into such a stranger.

"Mad men are easy enough to control, if you point them at the right target. Draklor's been doubling cargo output from Archades every year for the last five, and that's not even looking at what they've done for the fleet. Vayne's as arrogant as his father ever was, no doubt of that, but wouldn't you be? The Senate still hasn't found a way to check him, and the Emperor's _years_ out of the game, and knows it. A damn fool mistake he made, letting that boy get control of the skies as he has, but that's hardly our concern."

If it is one of the men who has struck him so, Fran thinks they may soon be running from at least one murder, if not the pair of them. It is a passing concern - if Balthier believes they must die, Fran is willing to trust him in it, has never seen him act in cruelty or haste. But then, would he not have told her of the possibility, long before they'd arrived? He is still staring, it is still anger, and pain, and an old, old wound. Little of such things in the Wood, but Fran had learned to mark them well among those in the outside world. Travelers and vagrants who had been struck in life like a tree cut down to the quick, and yet they had refused to die. What grew back was strong, but ever wearing the mark of that history. She feels the pluck of shame - foolish, prideful viera, to think Balthier too silly for such sorrow.

"You sign on with them and they'll have you by the balls for the rest of time. They could well conscript your ships, if Rozarria comes to the field."

"If?" The man chuckles again, and Balthier's expression wavers, as if a tremor has passed through it, and Fran is trying to get his attention though there is little she can do. At least that she might know his intentions - and how strange, to recognize that she is expecting to, that the absence is so keenly felt. A kinship Fran had shared among so few, even in Eryut: the best of those she had hunted with, that they could chase down the most dangerous beasts with little more than a glance and the slightest gesture, one spirit in two bodies and perfect harmony. It is not a matter of time spent together, or blood ties - it simply is. There is a name for it in her language, but nothing close in the words of humes even if Balthier, impossible Balthier, may now stand among those who so completely know her heart.

"How in hell did you ever get so far, worrying this much? I've got nothing they want, and even Vayne doesn't think this far past the borders of Archades, House name or no. Let them all tear each other into pieces - it will open up the field for us. Play it right, and the scraps from this war will make us all into kings."

Fran waits for what seems inevitable, but Balthier does not act, does not move, perhaps does not even breathe. It seems the men have come to conclude some business, she can hear the sound of a nib scratching across paper, and though she'd feared they might stay for hours it is a matter of minutes before their business is complete, and fortune grins her subtle, mocking smile - they do not even close the balcony door on their way out. Fran steps out into the silent room, with a caution that has nothing to do with being caught.

"Balthier?"

It takes perhaps three steps for him to clear his hiding place, and by the time he appears he is everything Fran has come to expect, all that she'd believed he was until now. Casting an amused glance toward the door, as if to thank their unknowing hosts, the tankard in one hand and he raises it in a gesture of victory - and if she had not seen otherwise, Fran is sure she would be fooled. He has not been hiding - that look is ever in his eyes, she simply did not understand what it meant.

"Care to see what else they've got in that cabinet?" He says, tossing her the key off the desk, and Fran knows it is less that he gives a damn for the brandy and more that it gives him an excuse to rifle through the papers and she very much doubts Balthier is looking for valuables, at least not the kind to be pawned or melted down.

"Did you know those men?"

"Hm? No, not hardly. Low House names, enough to have their share of trinkets - and rivalries, thankfully - but little more." So many people in the Archadian Empire that even among the most powerful, they must arrange themselves by the narrowest of degrees. "I could see the tips of your ears over the top of your hiding place, you know. I thought they'd have us for sure."

Fran finds a few bottles of a rare enough vintage, and by the time she is back at the desk Balthier has finished his investigation, nothing to suggest he's discovered anything valuable, whatever it was he was looking for. If it was not the men that pained him so, it was their conversation, and Fran thinks back on what was said, the most likely source of such concern. Nethicite, perhaps, a word she has heard before in whisper and speculation. A new hume weapon of some kind, as if what they have now is simply not destructive enough, and that on top of the mention of war? It is no small secret, those in Rozarria and Archades each keenly aware of the size and ambition of the other, and this is not the first there has been talk of the possibility of battle, not even from those planning to find profit in it for themselves. Balthier has never been much for talk of such battles, utterly disinterested in matters of honor or glory, but it has never touched him like this, and Fran thinks, as he turns away from the desk, that he may know that she has seen it.

At the very least, he does not look at her, making an approving sound at the bottles she has chosen, before putting them and their hideous prize in a bag across his shoulder. It is a quiet night, and an easy climb down from the balcony, and Fran knows she will not push him. It is not her way, though he is not Mjrn, who would come to her first with any trouble, any pain, and would never think to hide it. Fran can be patient, even though the look in his eyes… and yes, Balthier has come to mean more to her than she had thought possible, and there is little to do for it now.

She drops the last few feet, hitting the ground silently, Balthier only a moment behind, and he missteps slightly, stumbling. Fran reaches out a hand to steady him - and feels him flinch, ever so slightly beneath her grasp. He looks up.

"Fran. I…"

A low, threatening growl comes from the shadows. The extremely close shadows.

"… I do believe they have dogs."

Amazing how fast a hume can run, even one wearing heels and weighed down by two bottles of fifteen-year-old cognac.

* * *

The more there is to add together of Balthier, the less the pieces wish to assemble, this accounting of the mad romantic Fran has come to call partner, and friend. She has seen him claim with no irony that he prefers the quiet life, and not two hours later they will be screaming all engines full across the plains outside a city - any city - while chased by what seems every bounty hunter for a hundred miles. Balthier will state boldly that he is interested only in money, that his is no free service, and yet it will always end with a stammered apology from some grateful, small-town merchant, that they have not the means to repay for whatever service he has 'accidentally' rendered, but here is a crate of vegetables or bolts of cloth or something else Balthier will unload elsewhere, for little more than a pittance against the true effort made. He will smile and charm the gratefully weeping mother, after they've rescued her daughter from kidnappers, and Fran knows it will not occur to the woman until they are a speck on the horizon, how Balthier had managed to make her forget to offer payment at all - or that her daughter will likely be ruined in finding a husband to live up to the expectations of being saved by a dashing sky pirate.

It had amused him greatly, when she'd pointed it out.

Beneath the constant cover of his well-worn script - the smirking, indifferent pirate - Balthier is self-depracating and self-sacrificing and absurdly kind, and even though most see him for but a few moments Fran cannot understand how anyone is fooled. Nothing less than a hero from a storybook , though unlike the tales it is neither a particularly safe or rewarding profession, and his cocksure stride into the sunset covers a limp on more than one occasion. Balthier is one of the few she has seen who can cast healing spells on himself while wounded - no small task, which makes Fran wonder even more about the scars he does wear.

Of course, he is also a young hume, and in the midst of all his heroing and rescuing there is still plenty of time for him to act in all the ridiculous ways they seem to find so necessary. Fran quickly loses count of the number of times she has found him greeting the morning face down in the center of the ship's catwalk, wearing the grillwork patten of the floor from chin to eyebrow until nearly noon. Or the occasions he has been ignobly dragged in on the backs of his moogle crew, in varying states of dishevelment and coherence, to be dumped in his bed or the shower, depending on how well he made it through the fight. He will claim, each time, that he had rushed in to defend a lady's honor, and given that this is Balthier there is no saying he might not be championing the reputation of every drunken woman in Ivalice in his spare time.

The moogles have responded to this, Fran learns, by taking bets on practically everything Balthier does, and she has watched the gil pass back and forth between them based on everything from the prizes they bring back from successful thieving to how many clothes Balthier stumbles in wearing after a night on the town in Balfonheim. The odds change on whether they're mostly above or below the waist, _and_ if they're the same as what he was wearing when he left. So it is little surprise, late one night, the Strahl parked in a bay in the north of Nabudis, for Fran to hear laughter and voices shushing each other more loudly than the words they are speaking, as what sounds like a herd of giant tortoises comes stumbling up the stairs. She watches a few gil glint in the air, tossed from one moogle to the other as they walk past her toward their own quarters. The only thing Fran wonders about is what the point spread is for both a redhead and a brunette, and whether it matters or not if they dye.

She is restringing her bow, and keeps to the task as the three revelers topple drunkenly inside, barely keeping on their feet. Balthier has his arms draped around the girls' shoulders, and there are four bottles of wine between six hands. Laughter echoes off the walls as he murmurs something no doubt inappropriate, and the air is full of tavern smells: smoke and drink and hume sweat. It is not so rare that Balthier will return to the Strahl bearing any number of love marks, with his clothes well-rumpled or perhaps wearing an entirely new set, depending on the bed he has shared and the disposition of his current lover, and if she has the coin to cast at charming rogues. It is far more surprising, that he should bring them back to the ship - Balthier is very protective of the Strahl, and particular about its guests, and so Fran studies the women even as they stare back at her.

"Good gods, Balthier," the dark-haired woman murmurs, "the hell are you bothering with us for, with this waiting for you at home?"

"Ah, how rude of me." Balthier straightens up, and stumbles back a half step for the effort, and the fact that his charming smiles have no effect on her has never stopped him from beaming. "Ladies, allow me to introduce you to my partner, Fran. As swift as the west wind, as lovely as the the northern sky. And… well, admirably furred."

Magnificently drunk. It is quite impressive he is still on his feet, even with the support.

"Did you lose a bet, and they made you take him along?" The dark-haired woman says to Fran, taking a drink from the bottle in her right hand, while Balthier takes the other bottle out of her left. A Rozarrian accent, and a tattoo of a dark bird with its wings spread, wrapped around her arm and up across her bare shoulder. "Or is it common for viera to take pity on those who cannot look after themselves?"

Any sting in her words is negated by the way Balthier is nibbling at her neck, and she lets out a contented sigh, leaning back against him. The other girl still has a hand in Balthier's short hair, absently stroking, though Fran would guess she has never seen a viera, wide-eyed and momentarily sober with the shock, paying far much more attention to her than anything else.

"My name is Skylark, and my silent partner is Rose." At least on the even-numbered days, Fran thinks, rather uncharitably, "I apologize for disturbing you, Balthier did not tell us he had found someone who would put up with him for more than a port at a time. She tips the bottle in Fran's direction, with a welcoming smile. "Of course, you are quite welcome to join us, if you wish."

After all this time, with no further overtures and barely a flirtation, Fran had simply assumed Balthier did not care for aught but humes, though by the way he chokes on his mouthful of wine and flushes like a schoolboy, looking at her and then quickly away, it seems she may have been mistaken.

"A gracious offer, but I believe I will find the stars fair company for the night."

As far as Fran is aware, the moogles' quarters are soundproofed. For their sake, considering the giggles and moans and what sounds like more than one piece of furniture toppling over before she is out the door, she hopes it is true. Hardly any real inconvenience, Fran prefers to sleep outside when it is possible, and any city has its share of private, secluded spaces. She prefers higher perches, though Nabudis has its own particular charms, and it is not long before Fran is guiding a borrowed boat on the light night winds, laying anchor in the waters that surround the whole of the city. The lanterns on the ships around her glow softly, like scattered petals of the city's greater luminescence, and the moon is bright, full and low - the sort of moon that would mean a festival in Eryut. Fran stretches out on her back, imagines that Jote or Mjrn might be watching it too, perhaps even thinking of her, and she falls asleep to the soft sound of the lake lapping against the hull.

She takes her time returning, the sun well up in the sky and burning off the morning fog, but it is not all that unexpected to step into to the Strahl and find the Rozarrian pirate sipping at some of their more expensive coffee, wearing one of Balthier's shirts and nothing else, the fabric falling just above mid-thigh. The door to his quarters is half-open, and Fran can hear him snoring, the sleep of those who will deeply regret waking up.

"Pour you a cup?" Skylark says, and does when Fran nods, passing it over with a smile. "Rose is in there too, still. The both of them lazy as cats, I swear."

A comfortable, almost companionable silence soon surrounds them, not exactly what Fran had expected from the night before, nor the way the woman seems to be studying her. It isn't exactly intimidating, though perhaps it is not meant to be - if anything, it reminds her of Jote. Quiet and reserved, yet keenly observant and not at all afraid to show it. She is being measured, though by what mark and for what purpose, there is little telling

"You have known Balthier for a long time, then?" Fran breaks the silence, just to see what might come of it.

A smile. A shrug. "As long as any, I suppose. I should apologize again for last night, you probably thought he'd paid for us by the hour. My name's Skylark, though perhaps I've said as much. Rose and I fly 'My Bonny Bride.' We're a merchant vessel, mostly the routes between Balfonheim and eastern Rozarria."

All pirate ships are officially merchant vessels. The Strahl is three of them, depending on where she is and where she needs to be. Easy enough to assume that if a ship of a certain size takes a line anywhere near the port city, it's at least a matter of smuggling goods out of Archadia or back in from Rozarria, avoiding the worst of the tariffs and fees.

"We had some rather interesting trouble with our main engine, and then one of the glossair rings decided to… well, it was a very lucky break for us, that our paths crossed here, and Balthier was willing to assist. It seemed but fair to… reward him for services rendered."

The Strahl has a full complement of skilled mechanics, and yet Balthier is all too ready to handle a good deal of the the work himself, disappearing into the engine room on the lower levels for hours at a time. He goes there to think, he says, and many times it seems he thinks of nothing less than how to alter the entire ship, making it faster or stronger or just simply different. Fran has heard the moogles groan on more than one occasion as Balthier presents them with the plan, some new indulgence for his beloved ship, and Nono, the chief mechanic, often looks but moments away from braining him with the largest wrench in his arsenal.

"I did not know he… assisted other ships."

"Well, I hadn't heard about you either, so we're even." A friendly enough tone, as she takes another sip of her drink. "He's a treasure, that fool. I imagine half of us in the sky owe him at least some credit for keeping us there. A natural too, most the time he doesn't even have to look at the damn engine to know exactly what's wrong. I wish I didn't always feel like such a cradle robber, but I suppose an alarming lack of morals has its benefits…"

Fran tips her head slightly, eyes narrowing. It is not always easy to remember how humes age, but the woman is by no means old. She does not intend to be rude, puzzling out the woman's meaning, but she looks a moment too long and the other pirate catches her watching, recognizes her confusion, and lets out a bark of laughter.

"I will take that as a compliment, viera. Unless…" Skylark smiles. "Wicked boy. He didn't tell you? How old do you think he is?"

"Five-and-twenty?" Fran says, sure she is off by no more than a year. If not for the woman's words, she might have guessed higher. Skylark laughs.

"Barely twenty, if a day - and no, I can't imagine how that makes him such a shipwright, but so it is. Our little prodigy of the skies."

Once again, all that she thinks she knows of Balthier is turned calmly on its ear. All the ridiculous posturing, the gestures she thought so odd for his age are quite obviously _of_ his age, and it is the thoughtfulness, his strategy and skill that belongs to a man of far more years. How long could he possibly have been living this life, then? Surely it cannot be long. It has always been a question, but now she cannot even begin to put together an answer - and where, then, did the Strahl come from, and how in the world had he come to acquire it?

Skylark is still watching her, very closely, and Fran realizes what this is truly all about.

"You are wondering what my intentions are."

"I've heard many tales of the nobility and grace of your people. The viera may come into our world, but you hew to your own rules, and on the whole they are kinder and far more noble than our own. I hope you will continue to be a… good influence on Balthier, or at least keep him in one piece. We are all rather fond of him."

The question of exactly why is not always easy to answer, especially as the door creaks open, and Balthier stumbles out of his room blinking bleariy, rumpled and unshaven with a sheet wrapped loosely around himself and all the grandeur of some young, disheveled god of poorly thought-out ideas.

"Good morning, my lovely ladies."

"Afternoon."

"And a fine one it is!"

* * *

Author's Notes -

1. I thought this one would be two parts but it looks like it will be three.


	18. a kind of integrity 3

The legendary toothbrush does indeed exist, resting in the bottom of her bathroom cabinet, and no one on board has ever claimed ownership. Perhaps it truly does belong to a Judge Magister. As the second year of her life on the Strahl passes by, Fran has every reason to believe it so.

Despite Balthier's reputation for an excess of ill-timed bravado, not every job is as risky or fraught with peril as his best-told tales would imply. A fair portion of what they do isn't even illegal, or at least not interestingly so. Some smuggling, a few escort missions of either people or goods. A sky pirate trustworthy enough to complete a mission without defaulting midway for the highest bidder can be a good avenue to quietly transport what is already in danger of being hijacked, or kidnapped. Balthier has carried diplomats from Rozarria and complex, ancient magicks from Nabradia and treasures to and from any number of private sources, those items that need to be relocated out of the common flow of air traffic. Generally, it is an unnecessary step, a level of redundancy to calm the nerves of extremely cautious clients.

And then there is the day they agree to transport a bride to her wedding, and she falls in undying love with Balthier along the way and refuses to leave the ship when they arrive, much to the chagrin of her groom-to-be and the rest of the wedding party. Most of whom are heavily armed.

The next few hours are made up of very bad plans just as quickly composed as discarded, including Balthier's insistence that he and Fran are already wed - the girl is quite willing to share - or that he has only a month to live - she is sure her love will see him through - and a considerable amount of his ranting in the cockpit that the next time he redesigns the hull he will remember to add sections he can jettison at will. It all ends rather anticlimactically, when the moogles corner the girl while Balthier is frantically trying to avoid being blasted out of the sky by the mother of the bride. Fran only hears a fraction of their low, urgent conversation, but it ends with the bride-to-be quickly deciding to return to her beau, giving Balthier a wide berth and several alarmed looks on her way out the door.

The moogles refuse to explain themselves. Fran asks if Balthier would like her to bring a belated dowry, and if he ought to provide her with a ring in return. He storms off to spend a few hours in the engine room pretending none of it ever happened.

Fran puts her share of the rewards from those missions that _are_ successful towards her growing collection of spare yet finely-crafted weapons - knives, swords, a few bows, though none are ever quite the match to the one she brought with her from Eryut. Balthier is responsible for much of the other decoration in her quarters, gifts she'll open the door on now and then to find he has secreted in - a kaleidoscope, a set of cut-paper flags from Bur-Omiasce. A detailed map of the stars, all the hume constellations spread out across a paper sky. Almost from the start, he has kept her well-stocked in fruit, the mundane and the exotic both, whatever he thinks she hasn't tried - and always at least one pomegranate.

It is gestures like these that keep her from opening the hatch and pitching him to earth on the day they pick up what Balthier assures her is simple cargo, a crate of fair size to be moved from one of Rozarria's eastern ports through to Rabanastre. Their employer demanded the swiftest route, across Jagd-studded sands, and Balthier is one of those who is skilled enough - rather than desperate or simply stupid - to reach the other side safely. This talent is usually enough to justify a high price, and so Fran thinks little of what they are carrying or why - until a soft scrape catches her attention, and a louder thump, and she and Balthier look at each other, and back to the cargo hold just in time to see one clawed foot smash through the boards containing what they thought was, at the worst, a shipment of unregistered magicite.

It is a drugged chocobo - or was - and by the sheen and sparkle of its feathers and the fact that they're carrying it unawares Fran can only assume it is a prize bird, worth a great deal. It is also rather surprised to find itself in the skies - surprised, and very, very angry.

The moogles scatter instantly, locking themselves in whatever room they can reach first as the bird pries itself free from the container, claws scraping against the deck and its wings snapping out. Not nearly enough room to present its full fury properly, and so it lets out a murderous scream and charges the cockpit instead. Balthier chokes out a startled curse, pulling the Strahl into a steep, near-vertical climb, though the bird's claws hook quite well in the grated floor and it still nearly reaches the chair, beak snapping less than a foot from his head before it finally slips, tumbling backward with a garbled cry, a feathered boulder rolling to the aft of the ship and it is only the barest of temporary solutions.

"Well?" Balthier says, leveling out, eyes flicking to the instruments - he maneuvers through the Jagd on some combination of instinct and memory, not the sort of thing that needs testing by homicidal chocobos, though that does not explain exactly why he is looking at her.

"Yes?"

"I thought your people were good with animals?"

"Good enough to know when they do not care to listen."

Humes have all kinds of misconceptions about viera powers, though it's obviously more wishful thinking on Balthier's part than anything that she might save the day. Behind them in the corridor, Fran can hear a screech, the ruffling of feathers as the bird rights itself. The moogles have reappeared and are shoving at the furniture, swiftly unscrewing panels from the walls, all but taking the inside of the Strahl apart as they attempt to construct a makeshift barricade between the cockpit and the unholy terror that all too quickly finds its feet.

It is a contest of speed between the engineers and the bird then, the moogles unhinging a door only to bolt it into place across the end of the hall, dodging the snapping beak as they work, Balthier grimacing at the sound of his lovely ship undergoing such a slapdash transformation - and then the ship hits a pocket of dead Jagd air and Fran nearly slams against the ship's front window as they lurch forward and plummet out of the sky. The bird and the moogles and everything that hasn't been tied down hangs momentarily weightless in midair, Balthier cursing sharply above the warning scream of the instruments as he throws his entire body against the column to turn it. The Strahl sways drunkenly from one side to the other, finally straining skyward as the engine splutters and the glossair rings regain their equilibrium. Fran slowly straightens up from where she'd been clinging to the back of her chair, watching the moogles pick themselves up off the ground - and with a hollow, metallic clang, the chocobo spits a doorknob over the barricade and across the deck to land at her feet.

"Open the rear hatch, Fran."

"That bird is worth more than the both of us together." She reminds him, and for the moment Balthier is too busy steering to argue, the controls trembling wildly in his hands. The cause of all this insanity is still glaring, bright eyed at them, letting out a near-constant series of angry warks and chirps and trills, scrambling to its feet only to tumble again at another of Balthier's mad maneuvers.

"You're lucky it's not me you're dealing with, my friend," Balthier calls out, the ship finally leveling out in a moment of calm skies, though Fran swears she can feel the subtle sway, left and right, as they move around pockets of dangerous nothingness within the mist, "If Fran were not the voice of reason - wait, is that _my_ doorknob?"

He looks back, just long enough to see that the moogles have in fact used his door as their last line of defense, and as if the bird has followed along with his train of thought, it shuffles back a few steps and dives into his room.

"By every god that ever was, get it out! Get it out of there!"

Balthier flails impotently with one hand, unable to leave the controls, while the moogles stare back, not about to risk their own fur for his troubles. The ship lurches again, and Balthier is forced to shift his full attention once again to flying. All his focus, save the part of him now making a low, whining sound to accompany the ripping of fabric, the sound of glass shattering as anything in his quarters that can be destroyed is quickly rent to shreds by vengeful claws. Balthier flinches with each new sound, as if silently adding up the cost, and for all that Fran is fond of him, she is more fond of remaining in one piece, no one willing to do more than listen to the chaos slowly taper off.

"Shoot it."

"Balthier."

"Then shoot _me_."

A horrible sound from the hall, as if someone's shoved a whole pot roast into the external Mist intake valve, and a slime-covered projectile hurls past them, bouncing off the windshield and leaving a sickly green smear behind. At one point, it had been a boot. The left of Balthier's favorite set, if Fran had to hazard a guess. The bird stares at them a moment, feathers ruffling, and returns to what remains of Balthier's room.

"Ah, no. Shooting's a waste of a perfectly good bird," he laughs roughly, grinning like a madman, "we're going to _eat_ it."

A harsh shriek cuts through the low static of the open com, Jagd patches doing little better for the radio than they do for the ships. The other reason they haven't been paying too much attention to the skies, until the Rozarrian cruiser slips in behind them.

"Attention, this is a warning to the unmarked ship and her crew! You are traveling in restricted Rozarrian airspace. Identify yourselves or you will be shot down!"

Fran is already throwing herself into her seat, Balthier's hands tightening on the controls, promising yet another memorable escape. The chocobo lets out another furious screech from inside the cabin, smashing something that is no doubt irreplaceable hard enough to dent the wall.

"At least someone's enjoying themselves." Balthier mutters, and tilts the ship into a dive so sharp it might as well be free-fall.

* * *

In the end - as usual - it is all a bit of a debacle, though not without some gain. Balthier spends what little time there is while dodging their pursuers pondering how best a chocobo might be plucked, stuffed and roasted, and whether Fran might prefer chestnut stuffing or plain. The Rozarrians are ultimately scuttled among the Jagd, their ship damaged but not destroyed, left limping toward the ground. Fran still does not envy them the long march home. The chocobo is delivered unharmed and uneaten to its final destination, and the unexpected egg that it leaves behind in the nest of what had been Balthier's best shirts pays back for the damages to everything but his pride. Fran watches the moogles briskly establish a new set of wagers, should the situation ever repeat itself, though Balthier shies away from larger cargo in the months that follow, and it is a considerable amount of time before he stops comparing every new bauble to some far superior item lost forever in a chocobo's gullet.

Life goes on, through eastern Archades and Balfonheim, down past Dalmasca and back up through Nabudis, until even places she's never lived become strangely familiar. The word Nethicite flickers in and out of the world like a wandering ghost, growing rumor and speculation turning up in this port and that.

If Fran had not been there, the night Balthier became a stranger, perhaps she would not even take notice of it, or how Balthier seems keep track of every new piece of information, even trading the transport of some rare artifact for the price of being able to study it. Still spending much of his time on matters of high myth, what humes consider the earliest days of their history - Raithwall, the Sun Cryst, the Midlight Shard. He speaks to her of none of of his findings, or the purpose behind his interest. Fran has thought to ask him more than once, but there is a sadness in Balthier's eyes when he is lost in those contemplations, a desolation that always keeps her silent.

Fortunately, they are but brief mentions, scattered and forgotten amidst better days. Adventures that often end with the sun slipping beneath the horizon, the two of them riding tandem, Fran's legs tucked up against Balthier's own, leaning against his back, arms around his waist as he flies whatever has caught his fancy long enough to steal it away. He smells of sun-warmed leather and hume and though Fran has never regretted her choice to leave Eryut, she finds she is more now than simply satisfied, more than contentment.

Balthier makes her happy - the kind of happiness she knows now that she'd been hoping to discover, what she'd left the Wood for, not even knowing if it existed or how she might find it.

The night comes, then, when they have had yet another successful adventure and a bit too much wine, and when Balthier's arm snakes around her waist, it is entirely in camaraderie, simply one drunken friend propping up another. Fran wonders why that is what finally tips the balance, knowing his touch is completely innocent, to convince her of what she has been pondering ever since that night when the thought of bedding her made him blush and look away.

When they arrive at the Strahl, Fran nudges him gently to one side, up against the hull, and before Balthier can quite right himself, assuming she'd simply bumped into him, she lifts a hand to his cheek, leans in and kisses him deeply. Balthier tenses under her touch, and she draws away to see a look of surprise and dumb shock that is far more pleasing to her than his usual smooth chivalry, though his hands do slide up against her arms, a tentative, questioning sort of caress. Slowly, his fingertips catch beneath the edges of her sleeves, sliding down to trace the curves of her arm guards with amusing trepidation.

"…Fran?"

"Balthier." Fran smirks, and leans in for another kiss, though his hands tighten on her arms just before she can reach his mouth again.

"I… this… I mean, you are certain?"

As if she does not know her mind. Fran smiles against his lips, kisses him once, and twice - and then he is finally kissing her back, though there is little in it that speaks to the carefree pirate, the charming rogue. He touches her the way he holds the rarest scrolls, the most ancient tomes, care and reverence and what may even be a little awe. So serious, and she is surprised and pleased that it is her turn to play the fool, to have her way with this delightful hume. Balthier. Her Balthier, and Fran is a siren of a strange, cloud-strewn sea, this handsome sailor gathered up in her charms.

He looks very young in the dark, his eyes wide when she draws herself up over him, and his hands are not so sure and his mouth is not so clever. At first.

The morning finds them drowsing together, her leg thrown over his, tucked cozy against his side, one of his hands tangled in her hair, the other lightly stroking the top of her thigh. Such laziness is not, she knows, a luxury Balthier can always indulge in, often arriving on the Strahl in some varying state of half-dressed shambles. Usually with some evidence of leaping out a window, or otherwise dodging the startled fury of an unsuspecting brother, father or paramour. The shirt he'd left crumpled near the door is but half-embroidered, pretty enough that it appears to be a deliberate asymmetry, but Fran knows that the girl was only half-finished with the gift when her husband had come home early to find a naked pirate in his marriage bed.

It is the first opportunity Fran has had to study Balthier's own quarters, little privacy to be had aboard ship and no need to impose, until she had been so pleasantly invited to intrude upon it. She recognizes various baubles and trinkets from jobs they have done, items he has yet to fence or preferred to keep, and random gifts received, all piled haphazardly around the room. Some of them are stacked high enough to nearly touch the various holstered weapons and mechanics' tools that dangle down from the ceiling, tossed over the crossbeams. Balthier has a considerable number of scrolls, and even more books, also piled on any surface that might hold the weight. A large map of Ivalice covers much of the wall opposite the bed, with smaller pictures tacked here and there upon it, and what looks like hand-written notes on top of those, scribbled out on scraps of parchment. Worthy of a closer look, though for the moment Fran is feeling warm and lazy and prefers to examine Balthier instead, tracing the scar on his collarbone, the star-shaped mark she'd noticed the first that they'd met. He smiles when he notices her attention.

"It does give the girls something to aim for."

As if it had not been her own mouth mapping those marks the night before, feeling him arch and groan at the brush of her tongue, the gentle scraping of her claws. His fingertips stroke the fur at her throat with no small care, and she sighs, rolling onto her back as she stretches, enjoying the feel of his warm hand sliding across her stomach.

"Fran, you are every word any poet ever wrote about beauty."

"You said that about the last upgrade for the Strahl."

"Did I now?" He smiles, and then it fades as looks into her eyes, and away. "I, this, you and I… I do not wish…"

"You will be out chasing hume girls before the sun has set, Balthier," she says, and puts a finger to his lips before he can protest, "and I would have it so. I will not have this be a chain between us, for you or I."

He takes her hand, pulls it away from his mouth only to bring her knuckles back to his lips, a gentleman's formal gesture.

"Yet I fear you will ever be first in my heart."

It is pure pirate, a knave's seduction, but this is Balthier, and as Fran draws him in for a less polite kiss, she knows he is entirely in earnest. She also wonders what bets the moogles have been making over this.

"Fran," he murmurs when they part again, staring into her eyes once more. So earnest, her lovely hume, and more solemn than she had ever thought possible. "If I… you must know that, whatever happens, the Strahl will be yours. Always, until you no longer have need of her."

It is near to what he'd said when he'd brought her aboard, but this is not that, not anymore. It means far more than even being together now, with her body against his, faces a bare handsbreath apart - the ship is hers, should he fall to some ill fate, as the bow Fran carries had been handed down to her, its former owner long past hunting, a final gift before she'd gone to walk the next path. The only feeling more profound than her amazement at his gesture is the fear for why Balthier might choose to make it.

* * *

As Fran waits for the Archadian solider to arrest her, she ponders blaming Balthier for turning her perilously soft-hearted, but cannot claim it true. Seized by a ridiculous impulse, that much was sure, but the hume thief had been little more than a child, and so terrified when Fran had stumbled over him that he'd tripped the alarm in his nervousness. The punishment would be far greater for him than for herself, were he caught, and so Fran had let him run, had taken the treasure and gone in the opposite direction, what would insure his escape at the cost of her own.

Now, it will simply be a matter of breaking free of her captors and finding another way out, hopefully before Balthier decides to move on. It has been no small time they have been partners, but she has never done anything quite so foolish before, and cannot truly expect him to wait for her. Balthier will surely expect that she can simply find him again in the next port, though it will be annoying to do so, and he will tease her for it.

It had been an obvious lure to any enterprising pirate - the 'Lament of Landis', a set of gemstones that had been a part of the royal jewels, torn from their settings and scattered like the pride of that former republic, being shipped through a small Archadian port, on their way to some private owner in the north. Fran wondered, as she listened to the sound of armored footsteps hurrying to meet her, if the boy had been the son of some duke or knight, had come up with this plan as a way to win back some lost honor for a homeland he had never known. It is not her history, she sees little more than gil to be had, but even if she knew the whole of it Fran would not think such trinkets a proper trade for a boy's life.

A handful of stones that might carry the weight of a world within their facets - and for a moment she is not thinking of Landis at all.

A single soldier finally charges around the corner, only to come to an abrupt halt at the sight of her, and Fran knows that despite the cost in pride it is the right decision to stay. The boy may have been killed on the spot - Archadian law allows Judges to pass swift sentences for thieves - but she is a viera, not at all who the guard expected to find, and as he stares Fran straightens up to her full height, giving him her best imperious gaze. When he does not move, she holds out the bag of gems, listening to more clanking down the hall - the men who may have been looking for the boy now focused on her. If she knew the child had yet escaped, it might be worth trying to escape… but now that she is here, and it is clear these men are loathe to attack, she may as well give him all the time she can.

The guard raises his sword in what seems to be a vaguely threatening motion, obviously hoping she won't call him on it, and gingerly takes the bag from her. The other soldiers have halted a good distance away, unwilling to come any closer. It seems they may have never seen anyone like her before. Fran keeps her expression cold and impassive, though it is difficult not to smile at the sound of metal plates shifting in nervous confusion.

"I… ah…. you'll - you'll have to come with me."

It is a question, not an order, and Fran is half-tempted to say no, just to see what he'll do. Instead, she nods, and follows the guard out of the treasury vaults and through a short stretch of corridors, into the guardhouse proper. The rest of the men peel away well before they arrive at the guard captain's station, not at all wanting to be involved in this, and before long he and Fran arrive in front of a nondescript desk and an equally nondescript man, who looks from Fran to the soldier and back again, and seems in no hurry to hand out medals for valor.

"What have you done?"

"I caught this… uh her, Sir. Er, she was attempting to steal the… um… valuables. From the vault. Sir."

The guard captain looks at Fran again, and she returns his gaze with serene indifference.

"Does she speak?"

"I don't… believe so?"

A glance at her, one eyebrow raised, but Fran sees no reason to respond. Instead, she lifts her gaze to the edge of the wall, a small window, the wooden beams of the ceiling. It is a sturdy building, not particularly new or well-constructed, and the cells may have some weak points to favor an escape.

"You've brought me a viera, soldier. You know that, don't you?"

"Sir."

"A viera who is not an Archadian citizen. Or _anywhere else_, as far as I'm aware. What do you suggest we do with her?"

Maybe Fran will not even have to plan her escape. The guard captain might be amenable to simply closing his eyes as long as she agrees not to be there when he opens them.

"So we - I mean, sir, there are still - we can't have… people… and such just breaking the rules. I mean, she was _stealing_. What about moogle law?"

"Does that look like a moogle to you?" The guard captain sighs. "You just _had_ to bring her back to me." He pinches the bridge of his nose with one hand and waves them off with the other. "Put her in a cell for now. I'll… consider my options."

The guard marches her away, the captain muttering to himself so quietly not even Fran can make out the words, though she doubts it has much to do with options. It seems the clouds she had noticed earlier in the day have indeed turned into the rain they promised, a fierce storm that even sweeps a few drops between the bars of the high window of her prison cell, and there's little point in escaping into weather so dismal. It might even be enough to keep the Strahl grounded until she can escape.

The room is small, little more than a low pallet and a bucket, but large enough that Fran can stretch out on her back, hands behind her head and wishing she'd brought something along to read. It is worth remembering, for the next time she decides to play the idiot hero.

Behind her, she can hear light clanking, and tips her head back to see the guard staring, though he stumbles out of view when she looks. A second soldier - she can tell he is different by the sound of his tread - walks by slowly, and then a third. It seems this small outpost is now fully aware of her presence, and no one has anything better to do than come sneak a look. A spare blanket is slid without comment between the bars, worn but clean and soft. They ask if she needs anything to eat, and when she does not answer the guards talk quietly amongst themselves where they do not think she can hear, about how she might suffer in such a cell, and if creatures such as she is need open spaces to survive.

Obviously, if she but coughs a bit, Fran will be out of here before nightfall.

With little else to do, it is not surprising that her thoughts cant in Balthier's direction, and for more than just how insufferable he will be when he discovers her imprisonment. Fran does wonder where he spent his early days, cannot imagine it is any town as small as this. At first, she had not even been sure he was Archadian, enough smugglers and pirates who enjoyed affecting the accent, though since then she has heard him speak too often, in joy and anger and passion, to doubt it further.

It seems most likely that Balthier is a gentleman's bastard, perhaps fallen out of favor with the family. The child of a wealthy mistress, or the product of an illicit affair. It would explain a good deal, including his diction and his trade. Allowed a proper Archadian education by the blessing of some patron who was not quite 'father,' and then the chance at a position where the Strahl would be within reach, his for the taking. Had Balthier run purely for the chance at making the ship his? Or had there been some ugly maneuvering for power that had left him in the cold? Maybe this was some act of rebellion, proving a point, and after a time he even expected to return to the home he had cast aside.

What of the scrolls then, and the Nethicite, this silent search for answers he does not speak of? Every day there are more whispers, rumors that pass from ship to ship, an ill wind circulating through the ports - Rozarria and Archades have once again taken notice of each other, two sleipnir pawing the same ground, preparing to charge. So far it has been but small skirmishes, posed as little more than misunderstandings, but it takes such great Empires a good deal of time to rouse themselves in earnest, to push in earnest toward a goal, an enemy - war. If Nethicite cannot truly tip the balance in favor of those who possess it, the simple fact of its existence may be enough to rally men, out of confidence or fear, to convince them of the need to strike. The long-standing myth, the rumor is that Raithwall himself left behind protections, great weapons for his favored nations, those that a capricious fate has placed directly between Rozarria and Archades. For their sake, Fran hopes it is true.

"It's a bloody waste of time, protecting some rich bastard's trinkets like we're hired hands. Let her take the damn things for all the difference it makes."

The conversation is quiet, down at the end of the hall, but easy enough to pick out over the muted hush of the rain, now little more than a patter.

"Captain says there's a pack of bangaa coming in on a flyby, and they say that she's got some marks outstanding. We'll hand her over to them if it's true. No paperwork that way, like she was never here at all."

Fran's left ear twitches slightly, the only sign of her displeasure. It seems that luck and chance will not be satisfied until she gives them some proper entertainment.

"We're really just going to give her to those lizards?"

"If she's as good as they say, I think she can handle herself. Better a few bounty hunters than an Imperial record, anyway."

It's true enough, though Fran does not trust her luck that these are not a very particular group of bangaa, working under the banner of a rather nasty leader. His name is Ba'Gamnan, and he seems intent on capturing Balthier past what even a hefty prize would make worth the effort. It is a personal vendetta, and though hardly surprising that he could inspire such virulent ire, Balthier swears he cannot remember which of his many, many sins the bounty hunter and his fellows might be haunting him over.

Escaping before they arrive is now a matter of some urgency - she will not risk being the bait to lure him into danger. Fran's eyes narrow, the only sign of any rising tension. The question is only of which plan might bring the fewest guards while insuring they will still open the door. Once she is free of the cell, Fran has little worry of outrunning her pursuers, even if she has but a sketchy notion of the best route out. If only there were a way to take the gems with her as she fled…

"Who's in charge here?"

A booming voice shatters the relative calm, and Fran can hear the clank of armor, every man jumping to attention as a brisk stride moves down the corridor, the steady shift of armor in stride with the clattering counterpoint of a soldier trying desperately to keep up.

"I'm sorry, sir. We weren't expecting… there was no notice that you…"

"No, there wasn't."

The clamor comes to a sudden halt in front of her cell, and Fran wonders if perhaps she has done fortune some grave disservice, that bounty hunters should not be considered enough of a goad and a Judge has been put in their place. The armor is well worn but his status is apparent, marks of his rank slipping out of what is marked on the metal and into each sharp motion he makes, the booming echo of his voice behind the faceplate.

"By the gods, man. You haven't got her in chains?" He rounds on the guard, who quite obviously wishes to be anywhere else. "This creature may look a beautiful vision of womanly perfection, but beneath that silky fur lies a terrible, rage-filled demon that would tear you limb from limb! You cannot imagine the depths of her depraved arts, her seductive enchantments! When she was through with you, she'd devour your soul and you would thank her for the privilege!"

Fran is standing now, a little bit closer to the bars, uncertain whether to be impressed, amused or insulted. It seems this fool Judge has mistaken her for some sort of furry succubus, or perhaps a Marlboro in high heels.

"S-sorry sir. We - we didn't know, sir. We've never had one of her kind here, before."

"Obviously not," and the Judge turns back to the cell, lifting his faceplate with one thumb - and Balthier winks at her, grinning madly before he lets the visor fall, leaving Fran to gape in silent shock even though she should know better than to encourage him.

"I will require her weapons, and the goods she attempted to steal. We shall need to make a full report of this back in Archades."

He can't possibly get away with this. Surely the charade won't last long, armor or no, though there is nothing for Fran to do but go along with it and hope that when it all falls apart she is in a better position to help. The soldier gingerly opens the door and Fran allows Balthier to snap her into manacles, leading her out of the cell. The rest of the guard keep a nervous distance as he continues to weave fantastic tales of her unholy rampages, entire ships full of unfortunate souls falling to her lethal charms.

"I suppose, though, they mostly died happy," he muses, and it takes all her power not to see how much of his armor she can kick him out of, chains or no.

Entering the captain's office ought to be the end of the charade, but Fran watches quietly as Balthier signs off on all the paperwork with a lazy indifference, as if he actually knows what he is doing. Even more staggering is that it _works_. He exchanges a bit of pointless conversation with the captain and then they are walking out the front door, her chained arm in his left hand and the 'Lament of Landis' in his right, well secure in a pouch they have provided for him to insure its safe voyage.

"Why so shy? I hear women like a man in uniform," he says breezily, and then in a quieter tone, meant only for her ears. "We'll take the transport I borrowed to get here. I promised the moogles I'd let them strip it for parts."

"… seductive enchantments?"

"I had to make it sound convincing." How a muffled voice can still sound so insufferably pleased with itself is beyond her. "We really ought to have you get captured more often. It's far easier than all this sneaking around."

Fran does kick him, then. What is lost in speed is made up for by the weight of the manacles, and she isn't sure whether the clang of metal against his armored leg or Balthier's muffled yelp is the more satisfying sound. He frees her as soon as they are out of sight, and then they are moving to rejoin the Strahl, the ship tucked away in a makeshift hideout and the moogles ready and waiting, wrenches drawn even as they touch down.

It is not the oddest of late lunches, picnicking in the cockpit as the crew breaks down their prize, with Balthier sweeping his way across the radio bands, determined to find the conversation he does eventually stumble over, an increasingly loud discussion between a rather nasty sounding pack of bangaa and an increasingly unfriendly Archadian outpost that, finally, refuses to let them even land.

Balthier nearly laughs himself out of his chair at that, still chuckling well into the evening, as what is left of the sun stretches out along the top of the clouds in a bar of molten steel, the Strahl hovering quietly as the peach-tinted light fades into a star-strewn sky. They will set the ship down after a while, but such glorious vistas are one of the greater perks of piracy, and no one is in much of a hurry.

Balthier is stretched out next to her on the bed, his head near her feet, alternately flipping through a badly dog-eared book of dubious quality - as if he doesn't have enough daring rescues and blushing maidens in his diet already - and letting his hand trace just past the very tops of her boots. He seems to enjoy studying the boundary between her armor and fur, as well as testing his luck; if she is more amused by his wild embroidering of her reputation or is just biding her time before smothering him with a pillow. Or perhaps, inspired by his suggestions, simply killing him with her thighs.

"You have worn far more ridiculous disguises," Fran says, gazing at the armor now piled haphazardly in a corner of the room, props discarded once the scene had changed, "though I do not think it suits you."

"Quite the compliment," Balthier says with a smile, "although I suppose it is the point of such things. Dignity and authority instantly bestowed, no matter what fool may be clanking about inside."

It was one thing to shed the suit so carelessly, but Balthier had brought a blade with him as well. One she has never seen before, and though he'd frowned when she took it from him Fran could not allow such a weapon to be merely tossed aside. Now, she has drawn it from the scabbard, studying it with care.

The blade is elegant and finely-crafted, equal or better than any sword she has seen him carry, though Fran can see why Balthier would refrain from wielding such a conspicuous weapon, every inch of it undeniably Archadian. A line of ancient Kildean is engraved along the length of the steel, Archadia fancying themselves as both warriors and scholars, and they use the old language often in their adornments. It is perhaps a fragment of a poem on the glory and honor of battle, or service to one's nation.

The pommel is intricately inlaid with red stone that accents the various metals braided into the grip, rich shades of copper and gold. A crest has been set into the side of the blade, just above the guard and before the inscription begins: an ixion rearing on its hind legs, mane swept back and hooves kicking the air, encircled by a narrow banner. It is a detail too small for any proper inscription, though Fran has seen such things before among their estates - this is not only the sword of a Judge, but one of noble origin, and this is the crest of his House.

"It is no simple guard's weapon. Do all Judges carry such fine blades?"

"Finer, if they can afford them, but this sword is not…" Balthier pauses, just slightly too long to be collecting his thoughts. Fran says nothing into the silence, does not shift on the bed or make note of how he has gone tense and still, that he is no longer touching her. It is one thing, to walk around in a stolen suit of armor. It is another, to do it so well, that neither the common soldiers or even the captain would ever think to question him. "The Akademy gives out but one a year, to the student at the top of their class. The soldier who seems most likely to bring the greatest triumph to the Empire."

"It seems one would be loathe to part with such a gift." Fran says, and knows she is pushing him, as much as she ever has, and that it is not fair to do this in his quarters, the place he should have been able to escape to. It is surely no longer a matter of not trusting her, of not knowing her - Balthier is ashamed now, and afraid of her judgment, and Fran wants very badly to take this blade to whoever has dared to hurt him so.

"The man it belonged to no longer had need of it."

"… was it your father's sword?"

He laughs, a sound as bitter as it is surprised. "My father? Ah, my father…" Balthier chuckles, and the sound is painful, as he rubs his hands over his face as if to wipe away all trace of emotion. "No. My father could no more swing a sword than he could teach a chocobo to waltz - and he surely would have tried the latter first."

Archadia worships the might of its army as Rozarria does its skill in trade, and there are few who rise to any level of power or status outside of the ranks of the military. If Balthier is not a wealthy lord's bastard, then perhaps he is one who sought to raise the family name out of ignominy. A man who charted his own path through their demands, had perhaps found honor and privilege but obviously not the acceptance he sought. Fran reaches out, stroking the shirt above one of the more impressive of Balthier's scars.

"You were very young, for such a life."

"I showed… potential." He looks to the ceiling, not to her. "In training, we weren't allowed to heal ourselves, or each other. Not until it had a proper chance to leave a mark. If you dared to try, they'd give you twice as many for your trouble. Or your own squad would. It was something to be proud of. It built character." Balthier sighs. "I never developed the taste for character."

It is a difficult world for those of conscience. It is the evil Jote spoke of, all that the Wood seeks to protect the Viera from, that the sword Fran holds in her hand can be given to all kinds of humes for so many reasons, and so many different forms of triumph. Certainly there are good men in Archadia, as there are throughout Ivalice, but the right path is not always clear, and there are always those who benefit from taking other roads, and leading their men to choose the same. The same boldness, the same strength would have been in Balthier the soldier, as it is in Balthier the pirate, and how much worse the betrayal, to learn that swearing oaths to the highest virtues did not always mean doing what was right? How long to fight that fight alone, before it made more sense to simply _be_ alone?

However many men have been granted this sword, Fran is certain why Balthier received his. "You were a brave leader, and it was their good fortune to know you."

"I was… something. It hardly matters now, if it even mattered then."

No wonder they understand each other so well. Balthier is as much an exile from his world as she is from her own, and that it has been their choice does not lighten the weight of memories, or lessen the cost.

* * *

Author's Notes –

1. I thought it was going to be three sections but it looks like we're going for four.


	19. a kind of integrity 4

If one is going to steal from the Royal Palace of Rabanastre, there are few better times than the day of a royal wedding. The streets and pavilions are all crowded with revelers, the long and peaceful reign of King Raminas inspiring even the guard to be more interested in enjoying themselves than paying close attention to their duties. A swish of dresses passes above, bright laughter from the balcony, scattering a few of the petals that had been tossed from every balcony as the Prince of Nabradia and the Princess of Dalmasca had followed their long procession to the altar, to vows of marriage and an unshakable alliance between their kingdoms. Fran watches the small, white blossoms scatter in a false snowfall, as close as any here will see of it.

"The bounty on your head has been raised by another thousand gil," Krjn says, "Any higher, and I shall consider taking the hunt on myself."

It is a joke, though most would miss it, her calm tone as inscrutable as ever. It is much more than pleasant to speak with kin and kind, though Krjn had been a solitary hunter long before Fran had left the Wood, and even now it seems she has rarely looked back.

The Viera make a point to keep in touch wherever they might be, a sisterhood of travelers, of chosen exiles, and nearly all of them known to her. It is still passing strange when Balthier should set down in some familiar port and she should see a new face, a viera fresh into the world outside the Wood. Balthier, true to form, is quick to offer them passage aboard the Strahl, and whatever answers he can provide, but he is just as quick to leave them be, that Fran may keep counsel with her own kind. Balthier is dear to her, and in many ways he has a viera's own patience, but it is soothing in its own way to walk quietly with those who remember the same home that she does.

Krjn is not the only viera in Rabanastre. It had been startling to see Ajra appear, one of Mjrn's own friends, and though there was no reason to think she could not choose to leave - not as young as she seems, not after the years Fran has spent in the world - it was unsettling, still. Fran did not ask, but Ajra offered what she knew, though the Wood was of course unchanging, everlasting, and it was no surprise there had been little difference in all the years she has been gone. It seemed Jote had taken on all responsibilities as leader, and if she was a bit more somber, and Mjrn a bit more quiet - well, Fran feels the pang of missing them, as they surely miss her.

With all the time that has passed, it is still easy as breathing to remember the sound of Jote singing in the twilight hours, or Mjrn laughing as she chased Fran through the trees, in that stillness, the green-and-gold dappled peace that rests forever now, just out of reach. It is guilt and it is longing. It is not regret.

"I have heard of troubles in the North." Krjn says, stepping into the shadow of an archway, the cheers of the crowd echoing off the stones. A rich man is scattering gil coins, children laughing as they scramble in the dust. "Nabradia speaks of closing its borders. It is said their king has had meetings with Rozarrian ambassadors."

Fran nods slightly. She has heard all of this, and more. The skies are always full of chatter, rumor and speculation, but the steady stream has turned into a great torrent, those who move among the clouds realizing what those far below are only beginning to consider. War is coming, all but inevitable, and Nabradia stands fixed as the rock for Archadia to break upon. It is is a happy day in Rabanastre, the beloved princess and her noble, gallant beau, but there is no denying this marriage is far more than the joining of two long betrothed. Dalmasca will stand with Nabradia, will cast their fates as a single stone into the water. It had been Balthier to call it so, and quietly, his eyes fixed on the far horizon. She finds his gaze more often there than not, as if searching for a sign of what is to come.

A line of moogles marches past them, moving toward the palace, and Fran looks down at the last of these as he trips slightly, and looks up at her. Dressed in the bright colors of performers, and though many humes claim great difficulty in telling them apart, Fran does not share the problem, and this moogle has a distinctive notch in his left wing, regardless. A group of annoyingly skilled thieves who had stolen a rather choice scepter right out from under them in upper Rozarria, though there is little she can do about it now. It would be poor manners and worse sportsmanship to raise trouble, not to mention drawing far too much attention to herself. He lifts claws to brow to salute her, but quickly scuttles away when he sees Krjn watching. It is no surprise that they are not the only ones to take advantage of the crowds and celebration, though Fran thinks theirs is by far the most ambitious and foolhardy gambit. As usual.

"Nabradia is not the only one, they say, who seeks out new allegiances."

It feels strange to step back into the hot sun, the desert wind stirring the sand at her feet. Fran has never quite grown accustomed to Dalmasca's extremes. It is just as strange to walk with one of her own, and speak of politics as if they have some greater meaning. At times it seems all the humes know how to do is fight, and the richest and most powerful among them seem the most eager to struggle for more.

"Bhujerba will not openly defy the Empire."

Krjn raises a brow. "Is this the opinion of your pilot, then?"

It is known among the viera, that Fran has taken a hume as her partner, and if Balthier has noticed the weight of such a judgment skewing entirely in her favor, it has only made him smile. Worse things in this world, he says, than being a kept man.

An amusement that has faltered as of late, ever since the wedding had been announced, and Balthier had declared his intent on the palace vaults. His time as a Judge was brief, and it had not taken long before the hypocrisy of his duties had overcome the patriotism of youth. The Strahl had been his first grand prize, and with its theft he had cut all ties to his homeland irrevocably. Still, Balthier remains Archadian from birth, and he is grimly certain about the Empire's designs, and the motives of those with the strength to oppose them. Ondore would see no profit in interceding, and his ties to Rabanastre are merely shadows compared to the weight of Imperial coffers. If he does make a move, it will be only to turn a profit with Rozarria, and Dalmasca and Nabradia would still stand in between.

"I have no reason to doubt him." Fran says, nose twitching as a plume of smoke drifts by, carrying the scent of well-spiced meat. It is difficult to imagine such a lively, peaceful city as this might come to harm, though the long histories of humes seems to consist of little else. "If there is danger, I would come for you, would you wish it."

Krjn lets out a soft laugh. "Rabanastre is my home, and I will remain here, for good or ill. As I have heard it, your ship may not be the safer place."

Quite true, though the Strahl is where Fran belongs, and she has followed Balthier into folly often enough to think she will do aught else now.

The conversation takes a gentler, more festive bend, as Fran shows Krjn the book that had been at the start of all of this, what has now become a chronicle of her adventures, even a few sketches she has added to the remaining blank pages, though she has not the same talent as its former owner. He had been here once, the royal palace taken down in the same careful pen strokes as all else, and Fran wishes he could stand here now, to see the city dressed for celebration. Balthier had noticed her keepsake long ago, had decided the writing was surely Rozarrian, though even learning the words scattered across the pages had not given her any clues to its origin. He had said he would keep an ear out for any word of a missing adventurer, and though it has been many years, if anyone can find a clue it will be Balthier. He has a knack, picking up all kinds of information wherever he might be.

As he is at this moment, standing among the revelers in one of the palace's outer courtyards, or more specifically leaning on a pillar, speaking to a girl who, despite her youth and her giggling looks all the world like a coeurl preparing to pounce. It may have something to do with her clothes, or the considerable lack of them, Dalmascan formal dress with a preference for using much to cover nothing. Krjn makes the sound that everyone makes upon first laying eyes on Balthier, followed by the glance they bestow upon her, certain that she must know what she is doing despite all appearances.

"Take care not to let that bounty climb too high," she says, the hint of a smile over her shoulder as Fran lifts a hand in farewell.

It is easy enough to make a calm, slow circuit of the courtyard, so that Balthier can see that she has arrived while doing… whatever it is he thinks he is doing. After a time, Fran retreats to a pillar at the far wall, well out of the flow of traffic, in line of sight to study the palace's defenses, charting out no less than five possible ways in by the time Balthier has detached himself from the girl. He strolls lazily across the pavilion, tossing a few candied fruits into his mouth. A great banquet has been laid out for the city, the King's gift to his people in honor of a joyous union, and from what she can tell Balthier has not stopped eating since their arrival.

"I assume the treasure was not in her bodice, then?"

"It's a party, Fran. If you don't look like you're enjoying yourself, they'll know something's up." Anyone else would see a man half-drunk and thinking only of how to finish what he'd started, though she can see the quiet calculations behind his eyes. "Shall we take a stroll around the grounds? I hear the west gardens make for a lovely escape route."

No normal kind of heist, this, no simple matter of sneaking into the nearest vault and leaving with what is most expensive and easy to carry. Doubtless there are a dozen more sensible and profitable crimes being committed all over Rabanastre, but this is about more than simple gain. Balthier had stolen the Strahl - liberated it from Archadian hands, along with himself - and there had been no real plan in that moment, only clear skies and an escape from what he called the stifling weight of Imperial bureaucracy, the need to verify every act of justice with the "Second Adjunct Forms Office of the Department of Redundancy Commission," and that when his orders had allowed any room for justice to be done at all.

Now, as Archadia has set its sights on conquest and Rozarria makes ready to advance, Balthier has settled on a strategy, perhaps the reason he'd asked her to join up at the start. Three Shards of the Sun-Cryst, three ornaments of the gods, passed down through the ages to Raithwall's chosen heirs. The kind of weapon that could stop the advance of titans, could at least provide the foothold for negotiations, and though Raminas must possess the Dusk Shard he has yet to present it, to wield its power and demand compromise. Whatever the reason for it, that he is too old for such bold action or too comfortable with peace to truly read Archadia's intent, Balthier does not share his hesitance. He will find the Dusk Shard. He will make the stand on Dalmasca's behalf, and if power and threat is all that will move empires to action he will present them with both. Venture to neutral ground, perhaps, to the mystics at Bur-Omisace and demand parley. Stand strong where Raminas cannot, and find a way to change the course of nations.

All of this, of course, depends on if they can find it.

The reason for all his study, surely, as they slip into the palace, enough noise from the streets that no one notices their advance, Nabradia's impressive retinue providing enough unfamiliar faces that there is little worry in a glance, and they are fast enough that there will be no second look. Balthier has studied all his spells, collecting rare scrolls so that he can open the vault doors, even those that seek special keys. He has a few other tricks in hand that may prove useful in detecting Deifacted Nethicite - different from what they can make in Archadia, he says, and far more powerful - but Fran knows he is hoping for her aid, that her sharper senses and affinity to the Mist may prove useful in finding their prize.

Apart from that, and a few unfounded rumors, there is nothing to aid their search through Dalmasca's vaults. No certainty the Sun-Cryst's boon even rests within the palace walls, and though they find gems and gold and ancient treasures of all kinds, there is no sign of the Dusk Shard. Balthier hides his annoyance well, only a flickering intensity in his eyes as they move from room to room, the spells proving useless once they're inside, unlocked boxes and chests revealing coin and cloth and the gleam of countless gems, but nothing more.

It is only after the second time that they are nearly discovered, a misstep knocking a globe of gold and emerald to rattle across the floor, coming to a halt at the feet of a curious guard who has opened the door Fran stands silently behind that she knows this will not end in victory, even for all of the pirate's mad fortune. It is finding a single blade of grass at the bottom of the Golmore, and she knows that Balthier knows it too, seeing his shoulders slump as he shifts out of his crouch, the vault door clicking closed as the guard returns to his patrol.

"It seems this was all for nothing."

Fran plucks a sapphire from the table, rolling it along the back of her hand, what seems like a thousand glittering facets and as large as a bird's egg.

"Perhaps it is not entirely in vain."

The impromptu heist lacks style, nothing more than small items easily carried, though she notes the tome in Balthier's hand where any other man would have sought gold. A few more moments, and they are sneaking down a back passage, currently empty of all but night air and shadows, and the sound of the wedding feast still underway. A voice rises, and another, and then a cheer - Fran imagines it must be prince and princess kissing for all to see, a hume tradition, no doubt helped along by a considerable amount of wine.

Balthier is looking down the dark hall to the faint brightness at its end, a glowing hearth of sound and life that seems a different world from where they stand in cool darkness. A golden line traces the edge of his features, that familiar gaze to the horizon even with no open sky to see. A clink of glasses, a toast being raised, to the health and happiness of the bride and groom, and Balthier smiles, the way a man might at a fond and distant memory.

"I would wish for other things, before I wished her joy."

* * *

Tensions rise higher in the North with every day that passes, and it is easier and more profitable to do business inside Rozarria's borders, at least less of a chance of having the Strahl conscripted for service. Balthier is in low spirits for not having uncovered the Dusk Shard, and there seems little in the way of new information, even as the skies fill with chatter. No matter where they touch down, there are always nervous questions, wariness or worry all the more evident when it is badly masked with politeness. What is going to happen, and when, and no one has the answers. Bur-Omisace has called for negotiations, that all sides might come together under a flag of truce, and put a halt to what is happening before it can begin. Each nation has sent ambassadors, even Archadia, though Balthier barely gave the news any notice, too polite to say it would all be for nothing.

The Strahl comes under a bit more scrutiny, as does every ship of anything approaching an Imperial design. Rozarrian ships are hewn from darker metals, silver and gunmetal trimmed with wrought-iron lacework, a near-perfect contrast to Archadian cream, ivory and gold. Balthier contemplates painting the ship, and Nono contemplates taking the wrench to him again, but in the end nothing much comes of it. So many ships in the skies now, hailing from every port and all of them moving south. Those with the money to do so are already shifting their trade routes, adjusting their strategies, and that is a thought that can make Balthier's mood turn even darker, that there are those who are waiting with anticipation for what is to come, those who see nothing but profit to be made in chaos, strife and suffering.

They land one morning at the edge of a city on the Rozarrian coast, a small, wealthy town far away from even the hint of danger. Balthier is off to discuss a job that is both legal and simple, for once, and he has left a surprise behind for her. A family name, for a youngest son who had disappeared many years ago near the Golmore, no sign of him ever recovered. Before arriving, Balthier had written to them and mentioned her book and the response had been immediate, brought by private courier to meet them the moment they'd docked. A request that Fran should come as soon as she was able.

So here she is, making her way along a narrow coast road, the sea crashing up in great bursts of foam around spires of stone like well-burnished steel. The cliffs rise high, dark-roofed mansions stretched all across their edge, with high walls separating them from the road. Each of these is lined with its own pattern of painted tiles in brilliant colors, and Fran can easily imagine an adventurer born in such a place, raised between the vast expanse of trees that encroach upon the narrow road and the ever-present roar of the sea.

She had feared she might find a widow, with children who had grown up waiting for their father's return, but Balthier had been given the name of the family's estate alone. When Fran reaches the door a servant bows and leads her to a stone courtyard trimmed in white flowers, the walls high enough that the sea is shut out by the peaceful trickling of a water garden. The floors and walls are all carefully set with more of the same intricate tiles, etched in complicated patterns.

It is custom to bring a gift when visiting a Rozarrian home, especially on one's first visit, though Fran could think of nothing that would mean anything against the book in her hand. As the time passes, and no one comes to see her, she wonders if perhaps they have changed their minds. If coming here had truly been the right idea.

The lady of the house is tall, modestly dressed compared to their opulent surroundings. Old, for a hume, moving slowly and carefully, but her eyes are clear and steady as she meets Fran's gaze, pausing for a moment at the doorway before she smiles and bows her head in welcome.

"I apologize for not attending to you more promptly. I… it has been many years since I have seen one of your people, and never so close, and I had heard…" The woman pauses, and Fran has the suspicion she is rarely this far out of her composure. "I was told that you might have news of my son."

Fran holds out the book, and even before the woman takes it her eyes fill with tears.

* * *

"He had wanted to see more of the world. Always, always more. His brothers were businessmen, like their father, but even when he was small, my youngest was always off on his own. Adventuring."

Fran watches the woman turn the pages slowly, reaching out now and then to smooth a line with a fingertip, smiling gently. A few moments of weeping, and she had regained her calm enough to offer Fran a seat, and an apology for not knowing her way around viera appetites, unsure of what might offend. When Fran makes no particular preference, there are instantly plates of cake and sandwiches, rich coffee and imported Archadian tea - Rozarrians take great pains with their hospitality, a point of pride and one of the reasons they are so successful in trade. The servant girls, all dark eyes and dark curls, have been peeking around corners and through windows, never quite stopping to stare but certainly making sure their tasks keep them at this side of the house, and passing by the garden door as much as possible.

The woman has asked for more books to be brought, a small stack for her to look through, that Fran may gain some better grasp of the young man she's held as shadow, and silent guide for all these years. It is strange, how familiar the new pages seem, no real surprise to the careful, detailed sketches. He had been adept even from a young age, with portraits of friends and family rendered just as carefully as all the greatest splendors of Ivalice.

"I used to think my heart would stop, when he'd come back home with some tale of some monster he'd seen, some… hunt, I think they call them. His father tried to dissuade him, but there was no hope for it. He liked to chase after whoever was willing to go the furthest. So curious, always so curious, and he could never tell me why. I'd hoped… I'd hoped he would venture out and find a bride, or some occupation to keep him from harm."

"I believe I know someone a good deal like your son," Fran cannot help the slight, wry smile, "I doubt the most renowned of positions would have kept him from trouble."

"Or a dozen wives." The woman says, laughing a little, though it seems to open up an unexpected floodgate and she breathes in sharply, going pale once again. "Did… did he suffer?"

"No." Fran says, grateful that the truth can be kind. "When we found him, it seemed he had slipped from the path, and fallen. I am sure it was over before he knew what had happened. We buried him in the Wood. We did not… I did not know your customs."

"… and your Wood, is it beautiful?"

"Yes."

The single word is not enough, for either of them, but Fran cannot think of how to describe it all, how this hume, her son might have described it. The same journey for the both of them, searching and seeing without destination, without anything but the need to see what wonders lie past the setting sun. A breathless amazement at the world, with so much in it - too much - even this terrace and this view of the sea different than anything Fran has seen before, and tomorrow it may be another shore just as new. The world will not stand still for anyone, nor should it, and she is sorry for the death of this boy she never knew, though carrying his pictures, his wonder with her it feels as if she knows him as well as anyone. It feels like she has brought him home at last.

"The Golmore is an endless green, and even when the rains come the sun continues to shine, and all the world is ever warm and full of life. It is… very beautiful."

"A place unlike anywhere else, I am sure." The woman nods, and gently closes the book. "So, at least I know he is at peace. It would all have made him happy, I think - and certainly so, to know such a beautiful woman has kept him in her thoughts all this time." She clasps the little book to her heart. "I cannot begin to thank you enough, for all that you have done for me, for our family."

Of course she will try, and this being Rozarria there is no polite way to avoid accepting such a gift. Fran is thinking how Balthier might well enjoy a few days relaxing in some distant wing of this estate when a man lurches through the door, pale and wide eyed.

"Mother! Where is Adelia? Where is Raseda?"

The woman blinks, obviously startled by his lack of manners, and turns to Fran. "I would introduce my eldest son. Raseda and Adelia are my two youngest girls."

The man gives Fran only the barest passing glance. He has dust on his boots all the way to the tops, and Fran can hear him panting for breath. It seems as if he ran the entire way up the steep road she took to get here, no simple task. "Where are they?"

"I hope this is worth your impoliteness. Raseda is in the capital through the end of the holiday season, and I believe Adelia and her husband were in the north, in Nabradia, finishing up with some business there."

Simply by her tone, Fran can tell the woman is unaware of how badly things have deteriorated, that her children have chosen to keep the worst from her - which makes his panic all the more unnerving. Her son is strong, broad-shouldered and solemn, but at word of Nabradia it seems as if he might very well fall. A tiny noise of pain in the back of his throat, all the more alarming for how quiet it is, a hand pressed to his mouth and Fran needs to find Balthier, to know what they will do now that Archadia has finally made their declaration of war.

"Where did they strike? How far have they advanced?" Fran says, just as the man talks over her.

"_Where_ in Nabradia, Mother? Where!"

"The capital, I believe? No… no, that's not right. He does business to the west of it, there is a smaller town. Adelia said she might even wait for him in Dalmasca, with everything the way it is. Why? What has happened?" Looking between the two of them, with hands white-knuckled on the book that has brought some small part of her lost child back to her, even as this day may threaten to take another. Fran can hear the maids speaking to each other inside, a chorus of hushed, high-voiced whispers and panicked, fluttering hands.

"Has something happened in Nabudis?" The lady reaches up for her son's sleeve. "What part of the city?"

He laughs then, and the sound seems torn from him like a knife.

* * *

Fran does not need to see it. The force of it trembles and shudders through her, the same as it does through the ship, the skystone whining, fighting to stay aloft in the roiling Mist, and all the moogles are attending to it, fighting to keep the Strahl steady as Balthier stands in the cockpit, staring out over the void, the darkly churning emptiness that had once been Nabudis. A jagged gash in the heart of the world.

The radio traffic has been steady panic from the moment they'd lifted off from Rozarria, from every ship and every port, begging for news of family, of friends, and by the time they hit Dalmasca's borders there are a half-dozen calls from names Fran barely remembers, frantic to find the Strahl. Grateful to hear she and Balthier are all right, giving her updates on anyone who made it out, and those they already know who didn't, and the long list of those still unaccounted for. It is worse, in a way, for those in the skies, when a cargo haul might run in and out of Nabudis twice a week, and so the question quickly becomes one of pure luck. Rose and Skylark are still unaccounted for, 'My Bonny Bride' not yet on any of the lists being read off, those ships that were certainly in port when it happened.

_What happened?_ The calls, the same breathless question from port to port. _What has happened to Nabudis?_

"The Midlight Shard," Balthier said, and nothing more, barely a grunt to acknowledge her or any of the moogles. By the time she had returned to the aerodrome he had already started in on alterations to the engines, cutting the power but providing better shields against Mist disruption. It is the only reason they are in the skies now, when most other ships have scrambled for safe harbor amidst panicked stories of those with lesser engines, skystone scraps compressed into makeshift stones by pirates and smugglers that had suddenly crumbled, or exploded midair, no match against the turmoil in the skies.

Fran wonders if she might do the same, on fire beneath her skin as the Mist rages and roils, and it takes all her strength not to dig her claws into her arms until they draw blood, leaning heavily against the wall as she shivers and staggers down the corridor to where Balthier is still standing. His expression has been long fixed into a mask of violent anger, and it is as painful to look at as the view in front of them. Nothing but shattered trees and vast furrows in the earth, the blurry, insubstantial shadow melting to the horizon, as if a great hand reached down and pressed the world into a blackened smear.

The Strahl is poised much higher than she usually flies, a hundred miles or more out from the epicenter of the damage and still the engines threaten every few moments not to catch, to give up struggling against the chaos and sink down into the dark. It had been a race to even get free of Rozarria, airships being grounded for their own safety, for the safety of a world still trying to figure out what had _happened_, but Balthier slipped through unnoticed, wove past the border guards when they'd hit Dalmasca, and beyond that there had hardly been any air traffic at all. Bhujerba is in total lockdown, no ships in or out, though thankfully it seems the island itself is not in danger.

The last airship they'd seen had been Imperial, the Dreadnought _Leviathan_ far off in the distance when they'd crossed into Nabradia, and Balthier snarled 'Nethicite' under his breath and kept flying, and Fran had gone to her room to sleep, as if what had happened were a shock that would wear off. As if they weren't flying right into the middle of it, and things could only get worse, but she simply hadn't been thinking and now it is impossible to do so.

Prince Rasler - King Rasler now - is all that remains of the Nabradian royal line. The palace gone, the courtyards and alleys and the vast lake with its little ships vanished forever. The shop where Fran had last found fresh raspberries, with the little boy who'd shyly peeked out at her from behind a counter while his mother asked if she wanted blueberries as well. Three airships and all their crew listed among the early dead, men and women she had feasted and celebrated with over long, wild nights. Every person she'd ever spoken to in the aerodrome, and even some among her exiled kin, at least two viera who had called Nabudis home. Fran has never truly grown accustomed to the size of hume cities, long since given up on trying to figure out how many times over her village could fit in Rabanastre, or Bhujerba, but this destruction is nothing anyone, not hume or seeq or moogle, can begin to comprehend.

So many gone, swallowed up forever by the Mist that hisses in her ears, that tenses her muscles in fury only to drain them until she can barely stand, the world slipping in and out of focus in a violent tide. It is a fight to keep her balance, claws catching in the joins in the walls, her gaze fixed on Balthier who has not moved at all in the time it has taken her to get this far. Has not moved, perhaps, since he poised the ship at the edge of the abyss, and it hurts to get closer. This is not the Balthier she knows but some other man. A man who had been an Archadian Judge, who had run from their rules and obligations; who had done his best to divert the course of war.

A man who knew all along what the shards could do. A man who had seen this all coming, when _no one_ had seen this coming, and tried to stop it.

Fran does not know this man at all.

"Balthier… Balthier, I…"

He turns, and Fran watches the anger drain from him all at once as her hand leaves the wall and what's left of her balance fails her, and she falls into his arms. Balthier is staring at her with wide, panicked eyes, and speaking, but she cannot hear him over the roar of the ocean, the engine, the Mist…

* * *

Fran wakes feeling hot, her mouth sticky and dry, aching to the very tips of her ears, but there is no more feel of the Mist raging away inside of her. Just echoes, and the darkness, and the quiet breathing that proves she is not alone.

"… Balthier?"

A soft gasp, and the creak of the chair, and a cool cloth at her brow. Fran licks her lips and in another moment his arm is behind her head, a cup at her lips and she drinks deeply. She can hear Balthier's breath catch more than once, and it is a long time before he finally breaks the silence.

"I'm sorry, Fran. I didn't… I will not ask your forgiveness. I do not deserve it. I wasn't thinking of, I… I didn't think. I'm sorry."

He has turned the lights off for her sake, though her vision is still quite good in the dark. Enough to see the stubble on a face she has rarely seen other than clean-shaven. He looks weary and haggard, laid every inch as low as she has been, and Fran knows then that Balthier thought she was dying. It is likely he's been sitting here in the dark just waiting for her to breathe her last, exhaustion dragging him into a stupor until she'd said his name. Even now he is wary, almost frightened, bracing himself for a well-deserved retaliation. As if Fran has the energy to do more than blink, a struggle to lift her hand, sliding it gently along his rough cheek. He trembles beneath her touch, and shuts his eyes.

"Where are we?"

"Southwest Rozarria. As far away as I could get. I took her to ground. It's hard to say who's more annoyed with me, the engines or the moogles."

It is painful, his feigned attempt at good cheer. He thought he'd killed her.

"How long?"

"It's been two days." Balthier puts his hand over hers, turns his head to press a familiar kiss into her palm, but it's tentative, as if he doubts his welcome, and it is only when he sets her hand back at her side and rises to his feet that she realizes he is leaving. Fran tries to get up, but can do little more than lift her head.

"Where are you going?"

He doesn't turn around. "One of the moogles will be in soon, if you need anything."

It's not an answer, but Fran doesn't need one. Balthier's going to the engine room, and he'll lock the door, and he won't come out for three days.


	20. a kind of integrity 5

"Are you in or out?"

"In. Might as well make it a total loss."

"I fold. This hand's nothing but moogle shit."

"You cheap bastard."

"All right, gentlemen, who's buying my next round? Lay 'em down."

Fran turns away from the chatter at the table, perched on a seat in the balcony above near an alcove of half-open windows. It is a cool and quiet night outside, the sound of small waves lapping against Balfonheim's docks, nearly as bright outside as it is within. The sky is cloudy, but boats with lit lanterns are stretched out along the bay, with the running lights of low-flying airships winking overhead. The port is more crowded than usual, many of those displaced by the chaos on land finding their way here. Even the most ardent thrillseekers seem to be weighing anchor, uncertain of just how the wind will blow.

"Damn it, Balthier! Again?" Rose exclaims sharply, though there is laughter in it, no danger in the rest of the irritated groans. All the wagers this night have been friendly, no one wishing to play for high stakes considering what's happening in the world outside. "You really do have the gods' own luck."

"I'm also alarmingly handsome." Balthier, his voice as confident and cavalier as ever, chuckles to himself as he rakes the spoils across the table. Fran's stomach twists, and she keeps her eyes on the sea.

No one has claimed responsibility for Nabudis. No one will even openly assert that it was the Midlight Shard that caused the blast, let alone place any blame, but there is little doubt as to who has gained the most from such a tragedy, Archadia pressing in on the Dalmascan border even as the Gran Kiltias made a rare proclamation, marking a holy day in honor of all those lost. Urging for peace, that no more should follow on such a ruinous path.

His hopes, as with the hopes of so many others, had not met a good end. It had been only a matter of weeks since then, that the last of Nabradia's forces had fallen at Nalbina. The battle a rout, with King Rasler dead before he could even be properly crowned and the last flicker of hope for Dalmasca to defend herself snuffed out in the Empire's iron grasp. Balthier had barely blinked twice at the news.

He has returned to her from the inner heart of the Strahl almost a stranger, as if the all years between them had never been. The indifferent pirate once more, deflecting every look with a smile and every question with a glib reply and all that Archadia has done and will do is no more than water sliding off glass. As if now there is nothing left for them to do but see what new profit might be made from the chaos, such a lie that Fran is almost afraid of the truth it conceals.

"You'll get salt in your fur, if you stay there too long."

Fran turns, Skylark offering both a smile and a glass of the house's better spirits. She has never much acquired the taste for hume liquors, can barely remember the sour-sweet bite of what they'd made in the Wood, honeyed mead and flower-scented wine, but the drink is unpleasant enough to distract her from her thoughts, so Fran is grateful for it.

"Do the viera get seasick?"

"I wouldn't know. I've never gone out to sea." As far as Fran knows, none of her sisters have, and even exiled from the Wood she cannot imagine giving up on the trees completely. The pirate makes a small, dismissive sound.

"You're not missing much. I promise you, an airship's what you want, even with the skies the way they are."

Skylark swirls the dark liquid around in her glass, gazing into it much as Fran had been looking at the waves. It had been a whim of fortune, that 'My Bonny Bride' had not been one more ship lost in Nabudis, a single day's change of plan that had kept them out of the city. Now they are here for the same reason everyone has come to Balfonheim, to trade rumor and speculation, to survive on whatever work there is that won't take them too far south, and waiting. All of Ivalice just waiting to see how far Archadia will push before Rozarria retaliates. This very night, it's been said that King Raminas of Dalmasca has agreed to sign a treaty of peace. Handing his country and sovereignty over to Archadia to avoid a war he cannot win.

"How's he holding up?" Skylark says, the both of them watching Balthier flirt audaciously with the tavern girl as she comes into the room to hand out another round. Her smile is genuine and there is nothing in his to suggest otherwise, that this is anything but another pleasant evening in good company, with the war as only a troublesome inconvenience.

Balthier wakes up shouting in the middle of the night. Fran can hear it echo down the metal halls even with his door closed and locked. He spends much of his time behind closed doors now, or on his way out of whatever room she walks into, engrossed in his own affairs or at least pretending to be. Fran often thinks of stopping him, of putting her hands on his shoulders and just holding him there until he speaks to her, but she cannot bring herself to do it. Not when she can see the pain he struggles so hard to conceal, and not when she has no answers, no way to make this right. The rules of Eruyt have no purchase here, her wisdom with little purchase against the might of such vast armies, when whole cities can be scoured clean out of what seems barely indifference, nothing more than the smallest tactical advantage.

"He is ashamed of Archadia's victory."

She nods, tipping back the rest of her drink. "He's never liked it much, being a northerner." The silence between them stretches out, as Skylark rolls the glass back and forth in her hand. "Did you lose anyone, in Nabudis?"

"A few of my sisters, yes. It is good, though, to see that you and Rose are safe."

The pirate grins. "As much as anyone can be, these days. Hell of a thing, isn't it all?" Draining the rest of her drink in one go, pretending she doesn't care as much as Fran is sure she does. The words are insufficient - but deliberately so. Eloquence in the face of so much destruction seems almost an insult. "What's your plan, then? Balthier's always one with his next move in mind. If I were you, I'd think about settling down. He's more than good enough as a mechanic, you could turn a tidy profit while you wait for the skies to cool."

"Mm."

Balthier has said Fran has the perfect face for cards, even if she never plays. It does not seem to work on Skylark, or perhaps she knows Balthier too well, glancing down to where he is dealing out another hand before she looks back up, her eyes dark and hard.

"Gods save him from himself… the stupid boy thinks he can stop a war."

No. He's already tried to, and Fran isn't sure what will happen now that he has failed.

The tavern is very full, and very loud, so at first she hears nothing but a shift in the roar, the steady rhythm of crowded conversation knocked off its rhythms. It is chilling, to hear an entire bar's worth of drunks and pirates going perfectly silent as a lone voice repeats the message.

"King Raminas is dead, along with his daughter. The treaty is broken. Archades will be at Dalmasca by morning."

"Bloody hell," Skylark sighs, and Fran watches cards scatter on the table below as curses fill the air, the game instantly forgotten, "there goes Rabanastre."

A dozen conversations all spring up, overlapping each other until Fran can only pick out an odd word here or there, weary or concerned or irritated, though they mostly share Skylark's sentiment. Wondering about the trade routes that might yet be open, whether it might be better to risk a dash toward Rozarria in the middle of a war or wait for Archadia to close its new borders and hope for the best. Whether Bhujerba remains open, and just what the hell happened /this/ time. That if Archadia is so dead set on taking Dalmasca, on bringing everything they can see under the guns of their airships, should Balfonheim and every single one of them with a ship in port not be a bit more worried for their future?

Fran looks down to where Balthier sits silently, his gaze fixed on his hands, shuffling the cards once, and again, and again.

* * *

He stays out with the other pirates well after Fran has returned to the Strahl, but when she wakes it is not to laughter or voices or stumbling steps. If the door had been closed, even she might have missed the slight scrape and tap of steel on steel, light pouring out of a dining room that hardly ever gets used as such. The moogles take meals in their own quarters and Balthier prefers to eat standing up, giving over most the space to schematics, bits and pieces of whatever machinery has been the last to catch his fancy.

Fran leans against the doorway, Balthier hunched over his newest acquisition, a delicate cage of metal and wire and stone. He is squinting, even using his strongest loupe, and though the handle of the tool he holds is normal-sized, Fran can see the end taper down to a pinpoint - moogle-sized wrenches. Standardization is a frustrating business for skyships, with Archadian and Rozarrian employing different systems of measurement, each with their own tool set. The Strahl is a necessary mix of whatever is available in whatever port they land in, Balthier mixing and matching parts with careless abandon. The ship also contains a considerable number of moogle kit parts, fitted for the tinkering of much smaller paws, the kind that require the delicate set of tools he's using now. It is a strangely overcomplicated system, and intentionally so, though Balthier always seems to know exactly what he needs and where to find it.

She is content to watch him, as peaceful as ever while putting something together or taking it apart. The night is his, and Balthier works calmly and methodically through some unmarked space of time, until he finally leans back, stretching his shoulders and letting the loupe fall down to glint against his half-open shirt. He examines his progress with a critical eye, though Fran still cannot tell what it is, or whether he's succeeded. As she shifts in the doorway Balthier looks up, quite clear he hasn't noticed her all this time, and she aches for what scatters his momentary contentment - nervousness, sorrow, shame, always shame - finally settling back into a quiet, weary neutrality.

"Did I wake you?"

"No," It feels as if she is hunting an elusive beast, only a flicker of it visible here and there, and the wrong word or motion might chase it away forever. "Is that for the Strahl?"

"This? No," Balthier says, and spins it gently with a flick of his wrist, crystal chips refracting the light. "Skylark wanted me to see if I could improve on it for the Bride before they weighed anchor. It detects anomalies in the Mist, more than just those caused by the Jagd." Ever since Nabudis, there has been little way to separate rumor from fact but the stories of ships' engines overloading, or failing without warning, nowhere near dangerous areas - it's been enough to have pilots and pirates alike taking any advantage they can get.

"How well does it work?"

"Better than nothing, and not as well as it should. Judging Mist by machine has never been an exact science. I… much prefer your company, in that regard." The smile is painfully tentative, hopeful and warm and the first real sign they are still partners she has seen in a long time. Fran swallows back against sudden tension - the moment is fragile. It seems a risk to even breathe.

"I am here, Balthier."

He leans back, his head against the wall, and shuts his eyes, letting out a breath that seems to take most of him with it. Fran is across the room with a few silent steps, and with only a moment's hesitation her hand slides through his hair, claws gently scratching as he turns to rest his head against her stomach, his arm curling around her, holding her close.

"I'm sorry, Fran."

"Why?" It is the wrong question, one he will not answer, and she is not surprised when Balthier only tightens his hold. Fran thinks over the night, of the details of that disastrous meeting at the fortress at Nalbina, of truth and rumor and conjecture.

"King Raminas was not murdered by his own men."

"No." Balthier laughs, low and bitter "If the Empire reports it as such, you can safely assume it was anyone else." A slight, rueful shake of his head, "What a fool, to die like that. Believing great Archades would be magnanimous. Thinking he could trust them, when he had the power to save himself."

"Why did they bother with the lie?" Archadia showed Nabudis no mercy, and that was not even an act of war - why not simply open fire on Rabanastre? A show of strength where Rozarria was sure to see it. "Did they not wish to risk the Shard?"

"By any accounts, the Shards are all but indestructible. No weapon forged by man can so much as scratch them. Even the Midlight Shard remains somewhere in Nabudis, I suppose. No… this was Archadian politics at their very finest. It is some way of influencing Bhujerba, perhaps - or the Emperor proving a point to the Senate. Or his son, finally making a move."

"Vayne Solidor."

"The very same. As if the world ever needed another Solidor."

Fran can feel the tension in him, as if holding on to something too heavy for too long, and she has no wish to press him further. Instead her gaze falls to the table, the various tools and papers he has scattered about him. She had assumed they were all for what he had been working on, or yet again another upgrade for the Strahl. Instead, there seem to be all sorts of topics she might choose from, the esoteric chaos of his own quarters taking root here as well. The texts at the top of the pile are all old scraps of what seem to be copied maps of the Nam-Yensa sandsea, with notes in what she recognizes as Balthier's careful hand. After a moment, he notices her attention.

"The last Shard is almost certainly in Raithwall's Tomb, though the magicks on it and the Jagd have kept it untouched for centuries. At this rate, with the Nethicite under their control, Archadia will simply be able to park its largest guns above it and crack it open at their leisure."

Fran reaches down to slide another paper forward, a vessel with far more decks than even a passenger skyship, its name finally appearing at the far edge.

"The Dreadnought Leviathan."

"We saw it the once, near Nabradia. The flagship of the eighth fleet. Passed around between the Judge Magisters, depending on who is highest in the Emperor's favor. I believe Ghis commands it now." He reaches out, sliding his finger across the middle of the diagram, a straight line through the center of the ship. "You can't see it, but between the twenty-seventh and twenty-eighth decks there's a bulkhead a little less than nine feet further left than it ought to be. It's all perfectly sound, but one doesn't build a ship that size, not an Imperial flagship, and admit to such a mistake. So they pretended it was storage no one had the clearance to use, and the build team called it a door to nowhere. A hallway running the entire length of the ship, connected in all the places the workers found convenient when they were welding her together. The average soldier doesn't even know it's there."

Fran remembers Balthier winking at her, playing the Judge to a room full of half-interested men far away from anyone who might know otherwise. She tries to imagine how many soldiers would be aboard such a ship, and how seriously they would take their duties. The risk of any kind of plan, no matter how well thought-out it seemed, and how many maps of his promised protection. The question of why is not even important, nothing he is thinking could be worth such a risk.

"You would not do this."

"No," Balthier says, but the word does not give her comfort, not with the way he draws back from her, the way it sounds like regret. "I thought once, that it might be… but it doesn't matter now. Just fleeting fancies from a restless fool. The Strahl's spent too much time with her wings tucked in."

"Do you have a destination, or should we simply fly?"

He looks a bit happier at the thought, and perhaps at least some of this is not as bad as it seems, simply the frustration of being forcibly grounded for so long. "I would like to see how things settle with Rabanastre first. If Rozarria should…" Balthier trails off, rubbing at his eyes. "It's late, Fran. I should get some sleep. I don't suppose I could ask you to take this to the Bride tomorrow for me? Tell Skylark it should do some little good, though it is hardly a perfect solution. I… tell them that I am sorry, for not being proper company."

"I am sure you are forgiven."

Fran will remember this moment, when she meets his eyes and he smiles and the air thaws between them, and if things are not exactly as they were then there is the promise it will be so, and soon. At least, she believes it to be as she strolls through the streets the next morning, to the other side of Balfonheim. The Bonny Bride is docked in one of those acquaintence-of-a-friend-of-an-owes-me-a-favor that stand as the common currency among most sky pirates. Fran will remember how quiet the day seemed, sunny and peaceful despite what she knew was happening elsewhere, a kingdom fallen, a general put to the sword for treason and regicide. The loud, painful, furious history of humes.

Later, it will all seem so obvious. The thaw that was no thaw at all, Balthier no longer so troubled because he had finally come to a decision, but Fran does not know this even as she hands the box over, Skylark taking the lid off, lifting up the small, glittering patchwork that may yet keep their ship in the sky.

"Oh, Fran, there's something else… ah, silly boy must have knocked it in here by accident."

The bag is tellingly heavy in her hands, but Fran still does not understand. Not even when it opens to reveal more coin than she can count, loose jewels and thin gold bars stacked high, enough to set her up in any port she pleases. It is only when she sees the scrap of parchment, a piece of paper that barely counts as a note, torn at the edge as if written, ripped away and re-written many times over, that the truth reaches down and pulls out the ground beneath her feet.

_I hope this will show my gratitude in some small measure. Our partnership has been all that I could ask for, and it is wrong of me to ask any more._

_Yours always - Balthier_

Fran does not even bother with the door, leaping out the window and down to the terrace below with Skylark shouting after her, and her claws scrape on the tiles as she sprints across the rooftops, the heavy bag jangling in her hand as a match to her thoughts, a wild mix of anger and disbelief and the need to go faster, even though there is no reason to run as quickly as she does. Fran already knows she is too late, even before she slides around the final corner, even before she sees that the door is open, the hangar is empty and the Strahl is gone.


	21. a kind of integrity 6

On a map, the Feywood sits little more than a handsbreadth from the Golmore, what had once been all that Fran had ever known. On the ground, it is a whole different world.

The rippling rock gleams wetly beneath her feet, damp and chill even as the air burns with a false heat, the Mist an oppressive wall that makes her eyes water. Thick enough here to send the world into chaos, snow swirling around her, drifts that melt into swampy pools without warning, no two breaths the same. The air flickers with false reflections, Mist illusions that are startling in their sudden clarity. The trees stand fixed as fortresses, towering overhead to vanish in the clinging haze that falls over everything, but even with her claws against them Fran can feel no sign of life, as if they are as empty as the stones. All is eerily silent, and still. At times, even her lightest footsteps betray her, the crystalline husks of a thousand fallen snowflies crunching under her boots.

Each step she takes is more dangerous than the last, with lurking shadows in the Mist, creatures that scuffle and scream in the distance. More than once, Fran has heard a snort, the sound of something large catching her scent, but she is swift enough to slip past before she can catch the shape of it. It would be very easy to die here. Balthier is so careful when he wishes to be, but he is only a hume, and this strange, sprawling waste is proving well a match to even her keen senses.

It should not have taken her so long to find him, the Strahl with only a few hours' head start at the most and the _Bonny Bride_ at her disposal the moment she'd told them of Balthier's 'plan,' what little of it she knew only sharpening her fears. After all they have been through together, cave-ins and close calls and creatures of every shape and monstrous size, how great is the danger, that he would want her leagues clear of the fallout?

Balthier is going to kill the Archadian Emperor. It is the only thing that makes sense, and all too likely that he will try for this Vayne Solidor as well. He has abandoned her because there is no way he can think to do it without sacrificing himself. The first few days are the worst of all, then, leaving the _Bride_ behind when they run up against an Archadian patrol with too keen an interest in their ship, Skylark and Rose reluctantly returning to Balfonheim while Fran takes up with whatever ship will grant her passage. Using the network of all those allies she and Balthier have made over the years, and when those routes are exhausted, taking up the old novelty of simply being a pretty viera in need of transportation, and that alone finally gains her clear passage to Archades.

Fran is certain, with every day that passes, that she will hear of what Balthier has done before she can find a way to stop him. It matters little to her, the lives of the Emperor or his son, nothing she has seen or heard to make them men worth saving. Blood on their hands even by the most generous measure, but Balthier should not give his life for this, and he should not have to face it alone. More than once she thinks it would not be so difficult to take her bow and lie in wait, to take care of both emperor and heir herself and save him the trouble.

After so long amidst uncertainty and fear it feels strange to walk Archades' well-paved streets and hear so little of the war. Rozarria is of some interest, of whether they dare challenge the Imperial fleets and if they have strength to do so. Nabudis has sparked the same vague fears here as everywhere else, no city as safe as it once seemed, but there is little talk of Rabanastre here. A shame the king is dead, and one of his own to blame for the treacherous deed, but that is all so far away and the day has far more pressing concerns for the tradesman, the merchant, the scholar.

Fran spreads word of her search for the Strahl with everyone she knows who knows Balthier. She steps into Clan halls where her bounty is on full display, unsurprised when no one steps up to collect. It amuses most who hear the news, that Balthier has once again acted the proper rogue and betrayed his partner, not a single version of the story that suggests Fran was ever anything but too good for him. She ignores the gossip, let them all believe what they will, that Balthier is out on a reckless escapade with some new partner and there is no need for her to constantly search the skies, ears playing tricks on her with every ship that passes.

One of them catches her eye, a smaller, private vessel, emblazoned along its side with the crest of a House, two birds mirrored along a diagonal, a spear clutched in their talons, and Fran remembers a sword, and the Ixion rampant. Very little to go on, but Fran has no other clues, and if she cannot find him there is some small comfort that at least she might walk the paths he took as a child, to see the world that he knew.

It is easy to see how the narrow streets might feel a prison, the open sky a constant temptation, so much life suspended above. No matter where Fran is, or how high she climbs, the Imperial Palace still towers above all, gilt and glowing beneath the sun's heavy rays. Still, there is a beauty in its vastness, in the chatter of students she passes, the sounds of industry from the shipwrights' yards. Fran thinks of Balthier's patience, his sharp gaze and careful hands, and loneliness whets itself in slow strokes on her heart.

Archadia has more than one library. Archadia has more than a hundred libraries, from the general to the highly specialized. Some stand open to the public while others are reserved for Judges, mages and historians, a vast chronicle of history and artifact reaching back to those documents penned by the hand of Raithwall himself, well before the dawn of the Empire. What Fran seeks is hardly so esoteric, certainly not hidden, though it takes her some time to find the proper building regardless, and the moogle behind the counter still laughs, wings fluttering when Fran presents her question.

"An ixion, you say? Just the one? What color for the background? Anything beneath its hooves? Is it the mother's side or the father's? On it's hind legs, kupo? Are you certain it was just the one?"

Fran is not at all certain. For all she is aware, the symbol on Balthier's blade had been simplified beyond all recognition, and this will all be for nothing. The moogle, however, sees a challenge to his skills, calling to a bangaa working in the long rows of shelves behind him, and soon they are carefully paging through books nearly as tall as the librarian is, row after row of brightly colored crests, the rankings and coats-of-arms for all the major and minor Houses of Archades. Histories and holdings and family trees, and Fran is amazed by it, such deep roots here for such unforgiving soil, until finally the page turns to a white-on-blue figure in a familiar form.

"Wait." Fran says, and leans forward, though she does not need to see it more clearly to be sure. The horse, the mane, the banner - all is as she remembers it, though there is now a name inscribed on the narrow flag, and the moogle's nose wrinkles.

"House Bunansa? You should have said it was of the Thirty. We could have saved ourselves some time."

So many humes in Archadia, that they must divide themselves up again and again to decide who is most worthy. A hundred of their most powerful families, and even of these there are distinctions, a select few set aside. It does not surprise her all that much to find Balthier among them.

"This House is very important?"

The moogle snorts. "Only if you need to fly."

* * *

It does not take much effort, to find her way to the estate of House Bunansa. The librarian suggests a mapmaker cousin who sells guides for the purpose, just as in Bhujerba, with tours that can be scheduled when the families are away, so less wealthy neighbors might learn to covet in as much detail as possible. No tours of the Bunansa home, with the gate that Fran nimbly leaps firmly locked and no sign of servants or maids. The narrow hallway of a garden is well tended, but there is an air of abandonment about the place, as if no one has walked the gravel path, or admired the flowers, or come to call in quite some time.

The moogle had told her of Doctor Cidolfus Bunansa without needing to consult any guide. The head of his House, chief scientist of the Draklor Laboratories and the most brilliant shipwright of the age. A scientist as able to build a ship of stunning beauty and power as he was to give it a brilliant heart, responsible for as many advances in engines as he was in the designs themselves. A scientist who worked directly under Vayne Solidor, their partnership forged in drive and determination, success after success that had come to change the course of the Empire itself.

_A bastard's bastard with a pet lunatic on a leash._ The words come back to her, and the look in Balthier's eyes that night, that desolation she has seen time and again. In Rabanastre before the war, or gazing over the impossible horror of what had once been Nabudis.

Fran picks the lock on the front door fast, taking few pains to hide herself. No need, as it swings open she can see the mansion is just as quiet and empty as the gardens. Not a sign of dust or decay but all the furniture, each bit of finery under dropcloths, the whole house asleep. Her boots click quietly against well-polished floors, the closed doors all ornately carved and edged in gold, everything she sees speaking not only of wealth and power but legacy.

Archadia had been given the gift of Nethicite once more, not from the gods but the hands and minds of Draklor, a future dragged from legend, belonging only to men. The moogle knew little more of it, save that Rozarria now stood at a vast disadvantage, whatever might come, and there was one man to thank for it above all others.

_"My father? Ah, my father…"_ Oh, the bitterness there. The way Balthier had not met her gaze.

The librarian's paws traced to the end of the family tree, to the doctor and a wife who had died rather young - and that must be the portrait Fran is looking at now. A beautiful pale woman with a gentle smile, and the man with a hand on her shoulder lays to rest the last shred of doubt. Balthier will see that face in the mirror in twenty years' time, if he does not do so already - and she'd wondered, on occasion, why he had always taken such pains to make sure he stayed clean-shaven.

A son. Dr. Cid of the great Draklor Laboratories had a son, and there is a birth date under his name - a name Fran traces with the tip of her claw - and then a blank space. The boy had been destined for great things, or at least that had been the word, but it had all gone silent years ago. The moogle shrugged, his wings twitching slightly. House business.

It is what they say in Archades when things are private, or ugly, or messy, to be kept within the family. House business, for the wife that goes to the country for a rest, and never quite finds the time to return. An explanation for the fight amongst brothers for rank and status, even when the blood starts flowing, or the daughter who chooses love over fealty, only to be brought to her senses in the end, one way or another.

The son who becomes a Judge. The Judge who becomes a sky pirate.

The young Judge is very handsome in his portrait, all new and shining armor and youth and pride, though even here Fran can see the smile in the corner of his mouth, Balthier peeking out from behind this stranger's eyes. Fran looks at it for a long, long time, though much like the man she knows, it will not give her the answers she wants.

* * *

Fran is grateful for the long journey back to the guild hall, for chance to think, or at least to feel the weight of it. A truth that has brought her no closer to finding him, and if he is not here there is no other city that will know more, no place larger or more well-connected. Surely he would not have gone to Dalmasca again, for another chance at finding the Shard? Fran cannot imagine it, even without her, Balthier would not risk his crew to open warfare, would not risk the _Strahl_ on such folly.

It had been the father then, to instill such a love for the ships in his son. A father who had chosen war, and a son who had turned his back on all of it, his position and his wealth and a life of high honor. In Archadia there is hardly a greater sacrifice than letting go of one's own name, and Balthier had done this, and _still_ the shame of what he had been, of what that name means has kept him silent all this time.

The hall is bordered on one side by a shop that repairs sky bikes and smaller craft, and as she has done so often before Fran lingers there, closing her eyes and breathing in deep, just for the smell of welded steel and stone-bound magicks. Imagine, there had been a time when she had thought that yearning for home, for Wood and Word would be the worst she could ever feel, that she could never long for anything else so completely.

"When the moogle called me by your name, I was honored. I've never held a bounty half so high."

Fran opens her eyes, unsurprised that the viera looks nothing like her, though of all others it would seem the moogles might be better at telling them apart. Fran has seen no other of her sisters in Archades, the city with too many people and too few trees to provide much to draw them in.

Sije is smoke-dark, with gray spots that trail up the insides of her arms and a star-shaped, pale patch of fur at her throat. It has been years since they have crossed paths, the last on a caravan in the desert, and while Fran took to the skies she has made her name on the ground, with more hunts and more Elite Marks to her name than any other. She is of few words, as always, only a touch at Fran's arm - I am well, you are well - with no need for further pleasantries.

"A messenger arrived at the clan hall, looking for you," Sije hands over the small case, "You've been in the city all this time, then? No wonder we could not find you."

Fran doesn't know what she means, but for a moment it doesn't matter, unlatching the case with a spark of hope that blazes higher as she unrolls the map.

Moogles don't all know one another, except when they do, and so there is Nono's handwriting, and a tidy x marks the spot where the Strahl is hidden on the Ozmone plain. A shelter they've used before, and an arrow drawn up, to where Balthier has gone - and Fran remembers it, then. The first offer he had made to her, all those years ago, from the other side of a locked door. At the start, how he had wanted her for a particular job. It had been chance that had brought them together, and after a short time Fran considered it fate - but there had been a reason as well, though he had never made mention of it again.

The arrow points to Giruvegan.

"It is from your hume?" Sije says, nose crinkling with slight amusement. "You have parted from him, and now he seeks your forgiveness?"

"He left me behind. He did not wish to put me in danger." Fran says, aware her voice is hollow and harsh but she lacks the strength to lighten it. The humes believe Giruvegan is a place of gods. A myth, a broken city in the Mist, a fable of glory and knowledge and a place foolish men go to die. Her claws dig into the map, remembering all of Balthier's careful study, the spells, the ancient magicks - he needs her, he was right to wish for her at his side and a damned idiot to push her away now, and anger and fear lash at her to the punishing rhythm of her heart.

"Ajra has gone missing." Nothing less could have caught her attention, and Fran frowns, confused. It had seemed strange to even see a viera so young outside the Wood, and difficult to imagine she'd turned hunter, that she should have ever put herself in danger.

"We fear she has been taken. I have come here to see what might be found. Tyrn and Aisa are searching as well. Joce seeks her further south. We have heard nothing from Krjn, or her sister."

"Ktjn has left the Wood?"

Sije huffs a rueful laugh. "… and at such a time as this."

The viera protect their own, the responsibility of the exiled to watch out for each other in this world of humes. A rare thing, that anyone dares to attack them for what they are, but there are those in the world who see all things only for what they are worth when possessed, and do not care to hear otherwise. It helps, then, to have the sisterhood outside of the protection of the Wood. If any are harmed, all will know and all will answer, and their judgment will be swift and without mercy. Perhaps it truly is some rich fool, taking advantage of the war to think he might escape unnoticed, with Ajra in his grasp. It is frustrating, that he is not entirely wrong. Surely if there was no conflict, Fran would have known of it already. If things were not as they stand, she would not hesitate a single heartbeat before joining in the hunt.

"You will go after your hume." Sije says, no judgment there, even though Fran would not blame her for it.

"He is in danger. I will not abandon him. I cannot…"

The light touch of claws at her arm once more, and Sije nods.

"We do what we must. Elsewise, why would we have left?" She steps back, and so does Fran, for now there is finally a destination, an urgent pull to guide her. "I will send word, when Ajra has been found. Safe hunting, sister."

* * *

Crumbling pillars rise up out of the haze, and even when she knows they are real Fran approaches them with caution, wary of anything anyone thought wise to build in such a place. The Mist is so thick she wishes to cough, to sweep it away though that will do no good at all. She did not bother seeking out the Strahl, just a word to Nono that she was on her way, and Fran has boarded a dozen ships then, everything from cargo ships to cruising vessels and she notices little of it, only the means to get her past Dalmasca, over sands far distant from the occupiers and the occupied. On the way she asks the same questions, over and over, learning what little there is anyone seems to know of Giruvegan.

A place of secrets, and dangers, and power. Of course it is power, what else do humes long for? The home of the Occuria, all the legends say. Gods, or those powerful enough to be as gods. Giruvegan is the place of their birth, or rule, or exile, depending on the tale and the teller. Under their blessing, their benevolence King Raithwall united all Ivalice beneath a common banner, a time of glory and of true peace.

Fran cannot imagine Balthier goes there to supplicate, to ask their favor, and she is amazed that she ever thought, even for a moment, that he would simply give up, that he would wreck himself on drink or pity or some other easy vice when there the possibility of this, a war with heaven itself.

So here she stands in the Feywood on an ancient platform, tall columns rising around her, and words carved into the stone, older than Kildean, older than anything Fran knows. Relics from the lost city? Or created after, in an attempt to breach its gates? Fran turns a full circle in the center, seeing nothing beyond but Mist, wood and stone - there must be a spell, these words she cannot speak, to lead her down the proper path.

She closes her eyes, lets the teasing Mist flow past, searching - a viera knows no labyrinth, no path too tangled or hidden that she cannot find the end of it. If Balthier were here he might make some small comment about her twitching nose and then rub his shoulder when she punched him - she will find him, she will - and a few moments more has her stepping back out into the forest, sure-footed as ever, though she can feel it is not the same land as where she had been, the thought barely strange in such a place as this.

Fran is sure she is going the right way even before she finds the corpse sprawled out across the third dais, blood spattering the columns nearby, the body at most a few days old. Untouched, the unnatural beasts here seek to kill but not to feed, and Fran kneels down beside the fallen Archadian soldier, his thick-plate armor no match for whatever it was that had run him straight through. She wonders how many more soldiers came with him and how far ahead they might be and how Balthier could not be satisfied simply walking headlong into danger if it weren't also snapping at his heels.

She passes as quickly as she can through a half-dozen gates or more, until finally the woods thin to the remains of a path hewn into the hills, great cliffs that rise and rise and yet never reveal the tops of the trees, the Mist obscuring all even when there is a gap between the stones. Fran climbs for a very long time, in the light-sketched ruin of what must have once been splendid. All that remains now are the barest suggestions, a few stones here and there that must have been vibrantly colored, well-worn crevices that were once beautiful carvings in the cliff walls.

Everything echoes, so Fran hears them well before she comes upon the camp, a steady stream of voices, sounds of industry and exploration and none of them particularly kind. She finds a narrow path that seems to rise higher than the main, and follows it up, making sure each step is silent, that she does not dislodge so much as a pebble.

The Mist clears before her at the edge of the cliff, at least enough to see a wide, circular plain, pocked with shallow holes and small ponds of murky water, reflecting nothing of the sky with no sky to see. A cluster of men stand in loose formation, a nervous perimeter a few cautious feet from the edge, staring out at nothing. Mercenaries, a ragged band of thieves and jackals that would still call themselves sky pirates though they are nothing like. No sky pirate would ever hire himself out like a dog to the Archadians - and there are more of those as well, a cluster of soldiers in armor near a tent well-marked with crests of high rank. Chocobo carts stacked with supplies, the birds pawing the ground, trilling nervously - they sense it too, this place not at all where any of them should be. Fran cannot feel anything of the world around them, no sense of it, as if they are all suspended in a bubble, and all around them the void and directly across from her the door she has read of, though it seems more like a solid wall, dull and heavy with the weight of ages.

The Gate of Giruvegan, and few have ever seen it, and none have seen beyond.

A movement from the tent, the gleam of steel plate emerging, a hint of green like slime on river stones, and there is a Judge Magister, truly - and there is Balthier a step behind, with Ajra stumbling forward, pressing close against his back.

Fran is too stunned to move or think, to wonder how or why. Her sister is bound fast, thick chains around her arms and even thicker manacles at her feet. Balthier seems unrestrained, but he keeps himself close to her, blood on his torn shirt and not quite steady on his feet. A soldier barks out an order and one of the mercenaries grabs Ajra, dragging her back as she cries out, thrashing at her captors to little purpose. Balthier lunges forward, striking the man, only to take a blow from a soldier, and another, down to his knees and Fran's claws dig into the cliff, barely able to hold herself back. She does not have nearly enough arrows for them all.

The Judge Magister lifts a hand, the soldier stepping back. Fran cannot hear the words he speaks or Balthier's reply, only the tilt of his head and the bold grin, what Balthier looks like when he knows he ought to be silent, when he knows exactly what not to say.

The crack of steel on flesh whips his head back as the Judge Magister backhands him to the ground, a parting kick to the ribs from another soldier keeping him there, curled up as the rest move past. Fran looks to where Ajra has dragged off, huddled around a small fire in the middle of the mercenaries rough camp. It seems she is their prisoner, or hostage, or treasure, and they are not inclined to share. A good chance, then, that Fran will be able convince the mercenaries and the Archadians to turn on each other with little provocation, at least enough for long enough to see her allies free. She will have to reach Balthier first, though she doesn't understand how he was captured, or why he has not escaped. No eyes are on him now, as he drags himself to his feet, and even another dozen mercenaries could not come close to what he's found his way around, but Balthier makes no attempt to run. He only straightens painfully, with perhaps a glance at Ajra, and then he's shuffling slowly to the Gate.

He strays no more than a dozen paces from it for the rest of the day, as the soldiers and the mercenaries shift their positions at the edge of camp, and blessedly Ajra is left alone. Occasionally Fran will see a flash of magic near the Gate, and once Balthier is knocked flat on his back, a jolt from whatever magicks keep Giruvegan locked fast. A few of the mercenaries laugh. No one checks to see if he is injured, or worse, and it is a long moment before he sits up, shaking his head - and returns to his work as if nothing had happened.

Night does not settle here, only an odd dusky twilight that narrows the confines of the camp, with neither mercenary nor Archadian willing to stray too far from their comrades. Balthier never leaves the Gate, a satellite out of orbit with the clusters of men gathered near their fires. The Mist thickens, and continues to rise until finally Fran can move across the clearing without fear of being seen, the torches of the camp only blurred haloes in the eerie, shifting murk.

"Balthier?"

Every moment since she has stepped into the Feywood is worse than the one before, though nothing so bad, so unnerving as seeing him slumped and resting against the Gate, pressed there with an almost fervent desperation. Fran wonders if she might have to drag him away.

"You bastard, you bastard. How… how did you do it, old man? How?"

No, not resting, eyes half-open and breathing hard between muttered curses, half lost in dream or delusion and as she steps closer Fran can smell sweat and sickness. It takes him a long time to notice her presence, and even longer to focus his gaze on her. He is dazed and pale - too much magic and not enough food or sleep, with the red and angry marks of foolishly neglected injuries - but his sudden smile is still the same, bright and fearless as a boy's.

"Now, this I prefer. A thing of beauty, even among the damned. I did miss you."

He gives her a long look, as if committing her to memory, and then turns away, reaching for a book laying face down in the dust, slowly rising to his feet. He sways, catches himself, and Fran steps closer. He believes she is some Mist wraith, an illusion, and that he is still alone.

"What are you doing, Balthier?"

"Oh, I'm not even certain anymore. Trying to undo what's been done, what's been /undone/. Reaching for what will burn me, as if I'm not already on fire. Something with a bit of poetry in it, I'm sure. If I could make it rhyme." He glances back at her with a much more sickly grin, tapping at the stone with a fingertip. "Hoping whatever's inside this thing has a taste for Judge Magisters."

"We must leave this place. We must free Ajra and go."

"The viera?" Balthier says, frowning now, beckoning to a thought that refuses to come. "I can save her. I have to open the door and then I'll save her, before things can go completely to hell. I have to, before… Bergan wants to blast through it with Nethicite, did you know? _Nethicite_! What is the bastard thinking? As if he even knows how to think." He chuckles, a dark, unnerving sound. "Oh, they're on to you, old man, aren't they? You had your hour, but we speak of Archades - name a man who won't go twice as mad for half the reward - or half a man, twice as fast."

He is raving, and it frightens her. Fran reaches for him without thinking, and shakes him harder than she means to, enough to hear the tiny grunt of pain. "This is _serious_, Balthier."

"Oh no, no. Never take life seriously, Fran. It will kill you if you do." The skin beneath her hands is blazing hot, and for one moment Fran thinks she has come too late, that her ignorance has cost her everything - and then he blinks, and looks to where she is touching him, and up into her eyes.

"Fran?"

He might very well fall, were she not there to support him, and though Balthier does not move away Fran does not lie to herself, that it is less relief than that he lacks the strength to do much of anything at all. Balthier licks his lips, glancing over his shoulder toward the faint glow of the lights, pulling himself back into the now. He looks at her, and the Gate, and she feels the flinch, the horrifying realization of the state she has found him in.

"Get the girl, Fran, and get her out. Right now."

"Yes. We are leaving."

Balthier pulls away, or tries to, but this time she does not let go.

"I'm not worth - you need to protect her. You shouldn't even - I'm _not_…"

It's more than that. He _wants_ to stay. A gamble he cannot win and why, why does he not even seem to _care_?

"Is it power that keeps you here?" Fran gestures to the Gate, "Is this what you've wished for, all along?"

"No!" A truth so fierce, hissed out between clenched teeth as if Balthier has had this fight with himself many times before. Here it is, what has been between them all this time, in the trembling shoulders under her hands. Fran rubs a thumb gently in the too-deep hollow near his throat, whip-taut muscles shifting, tense enough to wince as he turns his face away.

"Why, Balthier?"

Is it weakness or anger that sees him this shaken? Sickness or fury, to make his eyes flash, as if Balthier could hate her for not hating him.

"It's not a matter of wishing, or wanting. It never has been - can't you see? How can you not see it, Fran? It's all around you, and you still - don't you understand what I _am_?"

"I understand," Fran says, her eyes fixed on his, "Judge Bunansa, I _know_."

One breath, two, and he turns so pale it's amazing she can't see right through him, as if he is just one more trick of the fog.

He is Balthier - for now and always her Balthier, no matter the name he takes, no matter who he is or was or what was left behind. As constant as any truth she has ever known, and Fran would tell him so, that there is no use in continuing to pay this brutal penance, least of all to her.

She would say it, except that the silence around them has changed, even the smallest whisper gone silent. If Fran had been paying attention, she would have noticed it already, would have thought of dangers past those even a Judge Magister might present. A good chance it would not have mattered much, a few moments' preparation little use against the nightmare that comes roaring at them out of the Mist.

* * *

Author's Notes -

1. One more part of this and it's done, I really mean it this time ^^


	22. a kind of integrity 7

There is some small consolation, Fran thinks, that though Giruvegan holds the promise of certain death it will at least be beautiful when it comes.

The massive beasts remind her a little of the great lizards that wander through the wildest parts of the Dalmascan sands, though these move with far more swiftness and grace. Steeped in the Mist from the moment of their creation, they glow and shimmer as if lit from within. All shadow and light and lethal elegance, but the furrows their great claws dig into the stone are quite real. The sound of their singing makes her shiver, a high and tuneless keening that fractures into staccato chirps. The sound is almost delicate, utterly at odds with the way each great step makes the ground quaver, and the Mist draws forward with them, the massive heads swaying and darting with swift curiosity as they observe those who have intruded upon their kingdom.

All the world pauses, waiting, the Archadians unmoving, even the pirates shocked into silence. Her senses are always keen, but in this moment Fran can see the tiniest flicker of light on the Judge Magister's armor, as his hand shifts ever so slightly for his sword. She listens to Balthier breathing, the odd hitch that speaks of bruised if not fractured ribs. Fran can even hear the brush of his fingers against his side, reaching automatically for the gun that isn't there.

It rests in the hands of a mercenary now. Fran recognizes the crack of the shot as it echoes through the trees, one of the men finally losing his nerve with an attack that will do no good at all. A chocobo screams, and a lizard roars, the sound shaking all around them, and it must be the Judge Magister's spell that finally shocks the world into action.

A dangerous gamble to use magic here, with the Mist so thick. If it were Fran's battle among her own people, she would tell her sisters to scatter. They would not think to challenge the beasts and certainly not on such open ground. Only one of her kin is among them, though, and the prisoner of those nowhere near as swift as she. Fran trusts Balthier to keep his distance, hopes that sickness and injury will dissuade him from further heroics, all her focus shifting to the battle breaking out in front of her, though even her keen eyes can pick out no sign of Ajra in the rising mayhem.

The Archadians fight as professionals, even against such a nightmarish foe. The Judge Magister roaring out orders as his men attempt to hold their ranks. Unfortunately for them, the mercenaries they hired share neither such legacy nor loyalty, and Fran watches one of the armored men near the camp fall, taken down by a blade from behind, the pirate loading up from the nearest crate only to be felled by one of his own, snatching the coin from his hands well before he's hit the ground. It's every man to his own survival now, greed and panic swiftly splintering a line that was never going to hold for long, with the lizards darting into the middle of the camp heedless of sword or shield. Soldiers fly through the air, the sounds of metal crumpling mixed with screams as enormous jaws rend through plate armor in a single bite. The panicked chocobos finally break free from their harness, screeching in terror, one of the monsters dropping what's left of a soldier's body to snap after it, catching nothing but the end of a few tail feathers.

Fran moves swiftly, for a time going entirely unnoticed through the chaos of the camp. It is almost amusing, when the first man finally turns on her, his sword drawn, eyes quickly going wide in surprise and confusion. If he had been prepared Fran still would have taken him easily, his shock simply makes the victory instantaneous. A few steps more and she's fully amidst the Archadians, trading wild blows with mercenaries and soldiers and trying to keep an eye out for the massive beasts still charging, still roaring, cutting vast swaths of carnage through all that remains.

It isn't just their size or their speed that makes them dangerous - Fran watches as one of the beast turns, his tail passing fully _through_ a cringing man, only to turn solid and slam into him as it lashes back around. A moment later and the beast is insubstantial again, a soldier thrusting his sword through hide no thicker than a cloud.

The beasts not only live within the Mist, at a whim it seems they _become_ the Mist itself, from deadly to untouchable in a heartbeat. As if Fran needed any more convincing that there was no winning this, that the only thing to do was find Ajra and run. Still no sign of the other viera, and nimble as she is her progress is slowed, dodging spells and gunfire, the ground trembling in a steady rhythm beneath her feet. Fire lashes out in front of her, and Fran hears a man's scream, an unfortunate brigand caught full-force in the spell. Unfortunately, it seems such magics also attract the monsters, and Fran finds herself at once the object of very large attention, the creature giving the air an oddly comic sniff, roaring at her as it charges.

A hume might stand frozen, their life flashing before them, but Fran is all steadiness, watching the sway of its gait, measuring the distance until the great jaws are plunging down upon her. A quick flip leaves her planting a hand on its nose, another jump poised just above the lashing tail, less moving herself than using its momentum against it, and as she lands lightly on the ground in its wake Fran finally hears the high scream - not hume, but kin.

Ajra struggles with one of the mercenaries near what she realizes are smaller sky bikes tucked away behind a tent, a few of the men using the distraction to load up what they can on the Archadians machines and make a dash to freedom. The viera sees her, eyes wide with fear and shock a moment before the man strikes her from behind with a vicious blow. She staggers, sagging backwards as he throws her roughly over his shoulder.

Fran's vision goes sharp and sparkling clear. She will free her Wood-sister from his filthy hands and make such a lesson of him that no one will dare to touch a viera for the next thousand years. Everything in her burns with anger and Mist-kissed vengeance and that is why she makes no note of the battle waging behind her, why she sees and hears none of it until the Judge Magister is thrown off his feet by the wild lashing of a tail as thick as a tree-trunk. He slams into her, sending them both down hard to the ground.

The Archadian has a short blade slashing up at her even as he seeks to untangle himself, and Fran rakes his armor with her claws, knocking the weapon it from his grasp. A shudder from the ground beneath them is the only warning, and she pushes off and away even as he draws his sword and the great lizard charges in. It has him, surely, but at the last moment the Judge Magister shifts nimbly out of the way, deflecting the brunt of the charge with a swing of his sword that somehow manages not to tear his arm from his body. It is not enough to hurt the beast, but it is far more than anyone else has managed, and the lizard actually stumbles, shaking its great muzzle in stunned surprise.

He turns to face her, igniting a spell but Fran is quick to counter before he can draw up too much power. The monster roars again, and for the briefest of moments Fran is both battling the Judge Magister and fighting by his side, each of them hoping the other might finally draw the beast's full attention as they dodge and strike and dodge again. In the half-moments between charges, he lashes out with his sword as Fran twists away, her kick to his kneecap deflected at the last moment. He's as fast as he is powerful, she will not deny him that, as the sound of claws on stone has them both leaping back, their fight once again interrupted by the flashing wall of fangs.

One swift glance confirms her worst fears. Ajra is gone now, along with several of the mercenaries and all they could steal away. The sounds of battle are slowly fading, anyone remaining either dead or dying or fled, and even as Fran thinks it the other beast appears, circling closer. It sports a long score along its side though there is no sign of blood, no weariness or strain or anything so mortal.

She is panting slightly, a few scrapes and bruises - far better than the bodies strewn around her but Fran does not think she could win this if time were infinite, and even a viera cannot fight quite that long. Behind her, she can hear the Judge Magister shifting his stance, and he will kill her at the first opportunity, no doubt of that. Fran prepares herself for that next charge, cannot afford to think further than it and hope some opportunity will present itself.

The massive spell that arcs through the Mist, knocking one beast into the next and sending them both sprawling would surely count as such, were it not for the source.

What Fran feels is not surprise, or it is a shock is so well-leavened with dread there is no telling one from the other. Foolish of her to once again forget about Balthier, to think that being half-dead would somehow keep him from the fight, keep him from the eye of this mad storm. Of course he would be here, and of course he would be standing atop the Archadians' surrogate plan, should his attempt at the Gate fail.

Balthier straddles a bomb, and Fran has no doubt he has been there long enough to see it primed and ready, not with the tiny sparks already shooting out through the slats in the wood crate around it. A strange, flickering haze curls out beneath his feet, the Mist twisting in glowing, swirling eddies, responding with increasing violence to the growing power.

He has a smile on his face, smug and certain and satisfied as if this in any way resembles a plan. He seems so certain, and Fran wants nothing more than to believe she is not about to watch him die, or perhaps to kill them all.

The lizards roar, and charge, and Balthier drops to one knee, still grinning like a lunatic. Fran feels it happen more than seeing, sense-blind and knocked right off her feet as the Mist around her is suddenly ripped away, vanishing so quickly it is as if the breath has been ripped from her lungs, her whole body trembling from the force of it. All that magic, all that power condensing down to a single point, right beneath where Balthier kneels. Where the beasts are nearly upon him and the shadowy afterimage of that, of Balthier curled around the heart of the bomb is burned into her mind's eye in the instant before the Nethicite explodes and the world disintegrates around her.

* * *

Fran comes to herself blinking back nothingness, fully blind for an alarming moment before she realizes it is simply dust in the air. An opaque haze coating her fur and the back of her throat in equal measure. She can just make out the bare shadow of the Gate through the cloud - no doubt it stands serene and untouched, no matter how many deep cracks there are in the stone beneath her hands. Fran tries, and fails to lift herself up, remnants of Mist lashing at her like tongues of flame. She winces, coughing, fighting to force the burning maelstrom back into sense. Slowly, very slowly, Fran begins see where the new edge of the world has been marked, those trees that had once lined the border now bare and black.

Everything stands silent, even the creatures of the Feywood rendered dumb and timid against such terrible power, no sign at all of the Mist lizards. Likely they are less than the dust beneath her hands.

Resting here, between the gods of old and their Gate, and the terrible ambition of the Archadians, Fran wonders if anything at all can survive.

The cough rings out into the quiet like some profound announcement, and it might as well be, the last sound Fran ever thought to hear. It is a struggle just to lift her head, a strain to look through the still-clearing smoke, and even more so when she sees the figure who stands there, dusting himself off, gazing around blearily.

Balthier, who cannot be alive, who can never be most of the things he always is.

He looks around, rubbing at his eyes, and finally sees her, relief and worry replacing weariness - and then the slow shift to blank surprise.

He jerks back slightly, and Fran does not understand, cannot place the sound of the pistol shot until she sees the red stain spreading across his shirt. It is violently bright, the only point of color in a world coated gray, and she strains with all she has to rise, to move, but her body refuses to obey her. She can do nothing, even as Balthier staggers, looking blankly to where the Judge Magister paces forward, tossing his gun away, obviously preferring to end it with the sword.

Balthier takes one step back, and then another, and with no sound and no fanfare he is gone, dropped right off the edge of the shattered world.

Fran waits, every breath a painful effort, as the Judge Magister leans over the edge. She waits for the next miracle, for Balthier to reappear, for the final piece of his grand plan. But Balthier is not hiding where he surely must be, does not reach up to pull the Judge off the edge, does not ambush this Judge Bergan as he surveys the remains of his expedition. His eyes sweep right over Fran as she lies prone, covered in dust and debris - and she waits for anything, but there is no sign and no sound save for, finally, that of the soldier's heavy footsteps as he strides away.


	23. a kind of integrity 8

Halfway down the cliff, picking her way across the crumbling stone and a few wide, twisting roots that work as the only decent place to catch her claws, Fran finally bothers to think about what she's doing, and how pointless it is. Balthier is dead, seeing it up close will change nothing, can only make the unbearable hurt that much more. Even if the shot hadn't killed him, this is much too far a height to fall and survive, even for a wind-touched, foolish boy. It will be exactly as it was with the hume in the Wood, Balthier still and silent with his neck snapped and she does not want to see that. Fran knows she does not, even as hand follows hand and she sets each foot down carefully, never pausing in her descent.

Ajra needs her now, desperately, and Fran risks all this for no reason, wasting time she cannot afford when there will be plenty of it later for grieving. When she knows, she _knows_ seeing him now will make it no easier to believe he is truly gone. It is a good argument, rational and just, and even Balthier would point out the sense in it - and does she even believe for a moment that she can even carry his body out, as difficult as it was to even reach this place?

Fran turns her attention back to the blank stone wall, and a part of her hopes she might just climb down forever, that beneath the fog lies only an endless path of handholds for her to focus on, and nothing more. All too soon, though, she hits the forest floor, and it does not take very long at all to find Balthier. What remains of him, crumpled against a rock, a sad mockery of his best lazy sprawl. She ignores the tears that fall, aware that this is not yet even mourning, that it's little more than the battle she's recovering from, the Nethicite that has her so weary and shaken - this is not true sorrow, not yet.

Balthier's eyes are open, the once-sharp gaze now glassy and gone, focused on some far-distant shore, and she kneels, reaching out for him. So many things she cannot bear, and this the only one she can change.

Fran's claws brush his cheek, and Balthier blinks. For one horrified instant, she thinks of other kinds of monsters, of the Feywood twisting his body into something terrible and dark. Slowly though, with effort, his gaze focuses on her and there is no mistaking it. No sound that can touch her like the wry, familiar warmth in his voice, even weak as it is.

"The less said about this one, the better, I think."

"… Balthier?"

"Fran." He blinks again, glancing around, "We _are_ alive, aren't we?"

"How," she whispers. "How did you…?"

He has an arm against his stomach, and she fears some further injury until he turns his hand out, revealing a large piece of magicite clutched fast - the better part of a floatstone, from one of the heavier crates the Archadians had brought with them, and he must have swiped it from the wreckage somewhere along the way, clinging to it as he fell.

"An old mechanic's trick. It slows you down enough, sometimes, with a bit of luck," he shifts, letting out a tight grunt of pain, "depending on one's definition of the word."

Fran's claws make quick work of the fabric at his shoulder. The wound is clean, thankfully, the bullet passed right through the other side, but Balthier wasn't in the best shape before this fight had its way with him. His eyes are still far too bright, skin afire as she presses her hand down hard against the wound. Healing him takes more time than it ought, the magic trickling out in a sluggish draught between her fingers.

"The Mist isn't going to do you any favors here, what's left of it." He flinches as it surges and fades, and she frowns, still in the Wood and very young the last time she'd had a spell fight her so. "Are you all right, Fran?"

"How are you alive? The explosion… how did you survive?" It's easier than answering him, easier than dealing with the aftershocks of fear and fight and the certainty of his death, with the way her flayed nerves are still aching from the shocking disappearance of the Mist and the wildfire that swept over her in its wake.

"I figured the Nethicite might catch the beasts out, no matter where they tried to hide. It… such an explosion displaces the power stored when the crystal absorbs Mist, releasing it all in a go. In the very center, where the pull and push cancel each other out - it's the only safe place to be. The eye of the storm," Balthier grins. "At least in theory. I never had a chance to test it until now. A shame it couldn't deprive us of Bergan's company as well."

He leans back, as she finishes what she can of the healing, a miserly effort but no more magic to be wrung from the air. His skin has knitted together but barely, still angry and red and Balthier is trembling all over, his eyes closed. She does not want to stay here, the forest around them far darker than it had been above, and every inch as inhospitable. Whatever beasts the fight had scattered, it cannot keep them at a distance forever, but she doesn't know if moving him will cause further harm.

"Ajra," Balthier's eyes snap open, answering that question for her. In another moment he is struggling to sit up, to get to his feet, "we have to get her back."

"We will," Fran says, and moves to help him rise when it is clear he has no intention of taking any more time to recover. He flinches, when her hand slides against his back, and she could take it for pain when he shudders, so close to her, though his gaze betrays him, as does the way he quickly averts his eyes.

"I know where they're going. It's the Grays, it has to be. If we could…" He glances up at the cliff, and Fran doubts she could make the climb were it her alone. Balthier quickly comes to the same conclusion. "Damn. I might have been able to salvage a ride."

"You do have a talent."

Oh, and how he freezes up at that - remembering what he is, and how she knows _exactly_ what he is now. The ghosts of an entire empire hang between them, so many secrets peeking from the edges of each glance and gesture, asking to be named. Whatever he believes, Fran does not desire to hear the whole of it, at least not as much as she thinks he needs to tell her. It weighs on him, as easy to see now as any sign of illness or injury, and she leans forward, pressing her brow gently to his.

"It changes nothing, Balthier."

He is quiet, and perhaps he does not believe her or perhaps he is simply summoning whatever strength remains to put one foot in front of the other. She can feel the heat radiating from him even as she draws away, and his first step comes with no small effort. Balthier sways slightly, hands clenched and Fran ready to catch him - but he keeps his feet, and she moves to follow. The trees are silent, this is not the Wood and even if it were she abandoned it willingly long ago, but Fran still closes her eyes for a moment, petitioning into that stillness for whatever she can.

_If not for my sake, then for Ajra… please. Please hear me… your children have need of you._

* * *

"Wait, Fran. Where… we can't… We can't just…"

Balthier startles suddenly from his daze, trying to pull away from her, too weak to manage more than a few steps. He looks around in confusion, and who knows what he sees, or thinks he sees.

"It's the Feywood, Balthier," she reminds him, "We must find a way out."

"Oh," He frowns, trying to gather his thoughts, no sign that she's told him this twice already, "Wait. I know… I know where they're taking her. It's the Grays, it has to be. We have to get her back."

If it came from anyone else, the reminder would be the gravest kind of insult. If Balthier did not mark every hour that passes with the same urgency, the same near-desperate vow.

"We will, Balthier."

Carefully, she coaxes him forward, focusing on each step. If he were to fall now, Fran doesn't think she could get him back up and moving again.

"I'm sorry, Fran. I'm sorry."

By blessing or skill or simply blind luck, the way out remains clear. Or perhaps the whole of the Feywood is well aware of the destruction at the heart of their wood, and who is to blame. Fran might feel a bit of shame at that, at her part in it, but for the moment just moving forward demands all her concentration. Balthier had pushed as hard as he was able for as long as he could, limping resolutely at her side, biting off curses when he stumbled on the uneven path. He's well past that now, one arm around her waist and leaning heavily against her, so hot where his skin touches hers and the both of them soaked in sweat.

He murmurs softly to himself now and then, and even with his eyes closed and strength waning his jaw is clenched fast, forcing himself through what Fran now knows is an unspoken penance. The same as it has been from the first moment they'd met.

"I'm sorry." He says once and again as they walk, as she scans the path ahead for danger, as she rests and hopes and coaxes him to drink at least a few spare sips. Apologies for leaving her or allowing Ajra to be stolen or being an Archadian or all of this and more.

"It's all right."

"You don't understand… I… you don't…"

"Shhh."

Fran brushes her lips against his temple, shifts her hold, and keeps moving.

It's dusk again, a full day gone by the time they reach the Strahl, and she has sense enough to see the gangplank down and the pale blurs of the moogles rushing forward. Fran hands Balthier off to them even as she drops to her knees, watching the gleam of healing magic quicken the air as they carry him off. She remembers what follows only in flashes - draining a waterskin dry, and then another, with hoarse instructions to Nono in between. Trembling like a newly hatched chocobo as she finds her feet again, staggering to the cockpit before she can think the better of it. Knowing there is nothing she can do in such a state, that her own quarters are the far better idea - but even as she thinks it Fran is asleep in the first chair to catch her.

* * *

The thrum of the engine comes to her first, but it is the sound of quiet conversation that keeps her from moving, eyes closed for just a moment longer. Allowing the peace of it to steady her, to seep through her like rain. A feeling closer to calm than she has known in a long time, since Nabudis. At last, Fran is content to open her eyes and linger on the sight - both familiar and strange - of a half-dozen of her kin all gathered together in the cockpit.

Sunlight gleams off several shades of armor and fur - Tyrn is sharpening the tips of her arrows while Aisa and Joce speak quietly, tucked against the wall and studying a map. Ljen - oh, and Fran has not seen her in what feels a lifetime - sits in the pilot's seat, claws tapping lightly at the controls, and though she does not take her eyes off the sky, though no one glances her way they know she is awake. A subtle welcome in the turn of a shoulder, the slight shift of an ear, so soft and so familiar Fran cannot help but ache.

"How long?"

"A day and half again." Sije says from the floor behind her. "I was with Tyrn and Joce when we got the call from your pilot."

"Balthier?" Fran rouses a bit further. So rare to see the Strahl in flight without his hand to guide her, yet Ljen is alone.

"The moogle. Your hume is still sleeping - Joce's healing did well for his wounds, but they were grave enough and… strange."

"Nethicite." Fran says, and needs say no more. The dangerous hubris of humes has never been in question, even from the viera who choose to live among them, when it seems the only thing they learn from disaster is how to improve upon it, to make sure tomorrow's consequences will far outstrip today's. Flip the coin, though, and Balthier is on the other side. A child of their training, their ambitions - and because of those the Strahl hums around her now, all she could wish of hearth and home.

As if her thoughts have conjured him, Balthier appears at the door of the cockpit. He looks pale yet, frayed at the edges and badly in need of a shave, though Fran cannot smell new sickness on him, or even the sharp-bitter tang of Nethicite, the acid-edged numbness where the sense of it ought to be. For a moment, his eyes hold some hint of the old spark of humor, wry amusement as he looks over their new collection of guests, and he seems about to speak. It hurts, to watch the moment pass, all expression draining away as Balthier remembers what they are there to do. He looks out instead through the Strahl's front window, eyes fixing on a distant mark. His jaw sets again in that same determined line, more severe each time she sees it, and Fran turns to follow his gaze as the edge of their destination comes into view. Deep grooves in the earth, stretching out as if the whole of the land had been gripped in the talons of some impossible beast.

The Graylands are a dead space, pitted and barren, a vast expanse at the edge of Archadia's western steppes. Hardly lands at all, only canyons, jagged, narrow chasms of dark rock widening into dull and lifeless plains. Dust scours at indifferent stone, the air thick and the sky ever leaden, lightning flickering in endless jagged strokes against clouds that seem welded to the horizon

A place no one could possibly have use for, save that the land is so parched and lifeless that metal cannot rust away. Discarded airships can be laid to rest here for ages without showing much in the way of wear. An Archadian flag marks the edge of the territory they bother to patrol, where whole ships are carefully tended for reuse, retired for the occasional parade or slowly taken to pieces. The rest of the canyon is a maze of uncharted spaces, where less valuable ships have simply been discarded, the bones of a country's rise to power left scattered in haphazard carrion pits. Only the worst of the outcast - those too feral and ruthless for even the lowest of ports - would consider this a place to call home.

"I can think of a few places to start, the more established holds," Balthier says, making a few quick marks on Aisa's map - and Fran wonders if he's been through these lands in the past, as Judge or… whatever came before. He glances up at her as if she'd asked aloud, and drops his eyes back to the map before she can speak.

"I saw the brands on the men, back in the camp. Marks of exile, though they wear them with pride, and pretend to live here by choice. I never thought I'd see a Judge Magister stoop so low, employing those so vile that even their fellow brigands have no use for them," Balthier frowns. "I haven't been here in… some time. I don't know how large their numbers have grown, or what we might be walking into."

"It is of little consequence." Sije says calmly, neither boast nor threat but simple fact. A thousand men would not stop any one of the viera from saving one of their own, and those same thousand men stand little chance of stopping six of her kin all devoted to a goal.

Six viera and one sky pirate, Fran amends, though Balthier is hardly recovered from his time in Giruvegan. She would argue that he has done enough, that he needs not risk himself at this, though she doubts anything short of locking him in his quarters and having the moogles weld the door closed could persuade him to agree.

"It is of no consequence if we cannot find her." Tyrn says, "Searching all of these places will take time we do not have, and if they learn we are looking they may move on and take Ajra with them."

Ljen brings the ship into its descent, the walls of the canyon rising up around them, and the tension seems to thicken around them even as the world slips into shadow. Two days already, nearly three, and the thought of even one more passing without their kinswoman safe is nearly unbearable.

"We will track her," Joce says, "the humes were not on foot, but there may yet be signs."

"Signs… oh, I'm a fool - they took the bikes. The damned _bikes_." Balthier says with a sudden, fierce smile, "Archadian craft, fitted to withstand the mysteries of the Feywood… and the treasures they thought to pry from Giruvegan." He's waiting for her to understand, but Fran can only shake her head, still a little tired, still shaking off the effects of-

"Nethicite."

He nods. "Wherever they're hiding, they would have flown right there…"

It's impossible not to notice Nethicite when it is active, the way it lights up even the barest tendrils of Mist like wildfire. It will leave a trail, and if the engines were even slightly damaged by what Balthier had done it would be a path that could linger for days, and miles, with no hume the wiser. It's the best they're going to get, and Fran can only hope it will be what they need. Ljen eases the ship into its landing, and Sije and Tyrn are out the door and off the Strahl before it can even touch down.

* * *

The names humes give to the world around them are oft odd and curious things, but if the viera had found this place, Fran thinks they would have called it the same - if they had bothered with a name at all. Everything in the Graylands, from ground to sky, is some variation on the same dull shade, the canyon walls mottled dark, with thick veins of cloudy quartz buckling out here and there. All of it coated with a thick layer of dust that Fran quickly finds herself wearing as well. The shadows are deep, though the air seems none the cooler for it. It smells only of metal and emptiness, with a stale, dry heat that has her wishing for a breeze. Fran wonders where Ajra is, if it is enough comfort for her to know that they are coming, that they will not stop - never stop - until she is safe.

The other viera are already gone, tracking through the canyons as swiftly as they can, searching out any trace of Nethicite. Balthier has recovered some, though he could never think to match a viera even at his best. Fran does not exactly shadow him, a fair measure of space between them, though every inch of it is full of questions, of that history they still pretend not to see. Now is not the time, though she thinks she has already waited too long.

"You don't have to do this," he says quietly, not looking at her. "Staying here, with me. You don't have to."

"I don't have to do anything," Fran replies, just as quietly, "just as you did not have to join us."

"Whatever wreck these fools have patched together to call a fortress, I'll make sure you get inside. Give me a little time, and I'll bring it right down on their heads."

The place they'd landed the Strahl was mostly barren, though as they make their way further toward a space the canyons meet, Fran sees more and more scrap piled up in the crevices, against the high walls of stone. Sheets of metal and bent girders, fragments of innumerable airships pulled to pieces and laid bare, the remains piled in haphazard, twisted constructions. A few long girders rise up here and there, still connected to one or two supporting arches. In the right light they gleam in nearly the same tawny shade as the canyon itself, as if they've grown here, the strangest kind of forest. An odd beauty to their forms, even broken as they are a certain grace yet lingers.

"You see that?" Balthier says, gesturing to a long span of metal in the middle distance, twisted at a few odd angles and burnished dark as if pulled from long-dead ashes. "It's from Landis. One of their cruisers, or what's left of her. The front half's missing, but they didn't bother with the back - you can tell by that ridge at the top, the curve of it - old design. Even at its prime they were antiquated, and the main beam - Landis steel was weak, and her builders spent too much time compensating for it, just to get her airborne. It's not even worth pulling down…" Balthier trails off, and this is not the first time he's regaled her with some trivia of the ships but it means more now than it ever did. "Archadia sunk her here after the war. Stripped her, and sunk her."

Fran doesn't see what he sees, the sense of it - it is the Wood to him, each strut and join as known and familiar to him as the trees are to her, the ghosts of these ships telling him their stories.

"You have been here before?"

The ghost of a boyish grin, and he glances down and away. "Time in the Grays is a fair punishment for all kinds of minor infractions. Insubordination. _Excessive_ insubordination. I think they would have posted me here permanently, were it not for my…" he stops, and swallows hard. "I was a child, though, the first that I came here - the first time of many."

"Insubordination?"

He chuckles at that, slight but honest. "I'm sure it was considered, but no. It's only a punishment to be _left_ here. The place is more lively than you'd think, if you visit at the proper hour." He grins again at her dubious look. "The Grays are borderland - most everyone dumps what they don't want somewhere among the stones, even the Rozarrians, which means if you can get out here with an arc welder and a few spare stones after a fresh ship's been dropped…" It's a good memory, she can tell by the glint in his eyes. "You'll have whole teams swarming what's left, taking whatever they can get to build with on the cheap. Merchants, racing teams, scrap dealers - anyone who can will show up to take what they can get. We'd cheat, and bribe the off-duty soldiers to come act as our bodyguards, to keep it mostly safe while we worked."

It's been near silent as they've walked through the chasm, only the wind brushing dust over steel and stone, though Balthier has been tense all this time, gun drawn at his side, keeping his voice down. The further they go, the larger the piles of metal become, spilling out onto the plain, with far more places for men to hide. Fran keeps a close watch for even the slightest hint of movement, but there is nothing. Just silence, the sound of their footsteps and Balthier breathing - until even that breath catches in his throat, and he stops moving as the canyon opens up in front of them.

So many ships, so much history stretched out before them, but Fran knows what he's looking at because she's looking too - a wreck near the distant edge. Heavily damaged, though what remains of its outer hull hasn't been removed. Enough to see the remnants of a crest still etched across its side - the Nabradian royal seal.

"It's the _Khiimori_. The imperial flagship. I wonder how close it was to the center of the city. I wonder where…" Balthier murmurs, his voice shaken, speaking mostly to himself. "You can see where the engine… gods, it nearly tore her in half."

Now Fran understands the extent of the destruction, the way nearly all of the underside of the ship seems to be missing, thick dark marks against the paneling from a series of concussive blasts, as if it had been broadsided once and again.

"The skystones." Balthier says, following along her line of thought as he so often does. "All the auxiliary skystones shattered, right along with the main engine. Every bit of magic on board just… detonated. They must have brought her here to study her, though I can't imagine… just to lift her, alone…"

No guard posted that she can see, but why would they bother? It came from Nabudis, far more to that curse than the usual superstition. Even the blackest of hearts would not be foolish enough to go near it - though Balthier would, she can see it in his eyes. If she were not here, if this were some other day and some other time - and maybe this is what he means to apologize for, and perhaps she can see why he would.

Fran hears footsteps too light for the ears of humes, though Sije deliberately makes more noise as she approaches, just enough to announce herself. No one speaks, this is hunting as the viera do, to know with a glance that their quarry has been found, and even Balthier keeps his silence, gesturing to Sije to lead the way


	24. a kind of integrity 9

The fortress is exactly as Balthier said it would be - wrought from ruin, with walls reinforced with the plating from countless smaller ships. Its main bulk is a dreadnought folded nearly in half against the canyon wall, the tail end rising up in an odd, skeletal curve. A good place, no doubt, for one or two lookouts watching ships come and go overhead, and presenting an overall impression little more inhabited than the wrecks that surround it. Fran can sense the Nethicite as they approach, practically taste it - Ajra is here, certainly. The viera have tucked themselves behind the better part of what had once been a Dalmascan transport, on the opposite side of the valley, and between the dun of their fur and the gleam of armor against the metal of the ships that surround them they are all but invisible.

"It's an old Rozarrian castoff - they convert them into freighters and passenger ships once they've been decommissioned." Balthier says, studying the ship through a split in the steel, "the skystone cracked, most likely, and they're siphoning off power from what's left of the main engine."

He is drawing in the dust, a simple diagram of the inside of the ship. Sketching out a plan of attack - and Fran knows they've stolen onto ships like these, one heist or another, but he is not the sky pirate tonight. He is the soldier, the leader of men, and it would seem a dark mirror against those carefree times except there had never been carefree times, she knows that now. Balthier had laughed and gambled and made merry, pirate and hero and knave, but always for him it had come back to this. No matter how long the line, it had always stretched back to the same anchor, to Archadia.

"A ship that size, there could be a hundred men or more aboard. I'm guessing they have someone to keep the lights working, but no one who really knows how she's put together. The security doors, the locks - they'd have left those open when they decommissioned her, but there's no reason they shouldn't still function. Little use for them but in an emergency - but if I can get to the right place, and break up their numbers... it will improve our odds."

Joce is pacing, and Aisa spins an arrow deftly between her fingers. All eager to get Ajra back, but they know the benefit of patience, of making all opportunities their own.

Deep as the canyons are, it does not take long for twilight to fall and give them the best chance they're going to get. The brigands do not guard themselves as if they expect any sort of attack, certain their reputation and their numbers will protect them. As the darkness settles there are even fewer men on any kind of patrol, and Fran can pick out the sounds of bottles clinking, drunken voices calling to each other as a few faint lights flare up against the darkness. An odd anger rises inside of her, that such unworthy enemies could do so much harm.

It feels good, the clean burn of rage, and stays with her as Tyrn takes the first one they reach, claws in his throat from behind, and he falls without a sound. Swift arrows drop the next three, slumping over their posts nearly all in the same breath, and Fran herself fires the final smooth shot through the darkness, catching the topmost lookout at the edge of his post. He topples forward, over the railing, and Balthier catches the body with a spell just before it can hit the ground, setting it silently in the dust.

Skybikes are scattered around the entrance, including the stolen Archadian ships, and Balthier quickly moves from each to each, a moment's sabotage against the possibility of escape.

"The Nethicite?" Fran says.

"In the cores - where it will have to stay." He says, "Nethicite is tricky, and they like it that way. Try to remove it, even crack it open for a look and the whole thing will go off. It's not quite a bomb, but still… unpleasant," he sighs, rising from the last of the ships, "too bad these fools didn't think to try it."

One of the fools spots them as they reach the entrance, his hand rising and ready to shout an alarm - Joce's arrow silences him before it can begin. Balthier is searching the body for information, Tyrn with one hand against the door when the sound hits, a distant roar that shakes both steel and sky. Half-howl and half-scream, and even Sije is unnerved by it.

"Well,_ that's_ not on my map." Balthier says softly.

* * *

Once, the ship had been fitted for combat, though it is the scraps and fragments of its second, more luxurious life that cling to it still. Scraps of colorful paper on half-rotted walls, the plush carpeting all but undone by wear, filth and time. The familiar smell of metal is cut by the stink of unwashed hume and drink, machine oil and blood and countless miseries. The main hallway branches off in a few large rooms, empty now, perhaps used to offload their most recent cargo - and Fran does not let herself think on it, what will happen if Ajra has been taken elsewhere.

No sign of the beast that had made such a violent cry, though there is nothing to do but keep moving forward, to get what is theirs and get out before they can find out what it is. Hume voices finally carry from the other side of a door, and Sije kicks it wide open. The four men are chatting around what must be one of the main radios - three of them die before they have a chance to do more than look up in surprise. The fourth makes a lunge for the radio, or what might be an alarm, only to stop at the click of Balthier's pistol against his temple.

"The viera you stole." Balthier says with murderous calm, "where is she?"

"I… I don't… I don't…"

"Fran, do something terrible to his vital organs."

"Wait!" The man howls, before she can even take a step forward, "wait. She's in the main hall, Jacus keeps her with him in the main hall. You won't get to her, though, he's got more than half the crew in there. Court's in session."

Balthier nods slightly. "Take off your coat."

"What?"

"Start with the kidneys, Fran."

"Gods' balls, fine! Fine! Take it." He pulls it off, handing it over, looking warily between the viera, "Now, are you going to-"

Balthier snaps his hand around fast, pistol cracking against the man's head hard enough that he hits the desk before falling to the floor. He shrugs the coat on, quickly dismantling the radio, pocketing several pieces before checking the fallen man, stripping him of a short knife and a ring of keys, anything that might prove useful. Maybe, Fran thinks, he is not just the soldier now - perhaps this is Judge Bunansa of old. Cold and determined, with a gaze that lets nothing in.

"Our plan?" Sije asks him, as the other viera quickly retrieve their arrows.

"Time to file a grievance."

It does not take long to reach what must be the main hall, the closed door quite large but unguarded, and Fran can hear the sound of many loud voices shouting and cheering beyond. Balthier motions them to a side passage, and Fran knows what he is searching for even as he slides the edge of the knife into a thin gap in the wall, and with a quiet click the hatch gives way, the ladder revealing itself.

"I'll be in the other passage," he tips his head toward the opposite wall, another hidden hatch, "doing what I can. Go up into the scaffolding, and wait for my signal."

The viera do not ask what the signal will be, assuming Fran will know it - and she does not need to ask, partnered to him long enough to be sure there will be no mistaking it.

* * *

The ceiling of the great hall had been stripped away when the ship became a passenger vessel, rebuilt with great curved pieces of glass to let in the glories of the sky. Even with the bright lights of the floor below, Fran can still pick out the weak pinpoints of a few stars beyond the high canyon walls. It had been a ballroom, once upon a time, with a lingering sheen here and there on the old parquet floors. Whatever majesty remains is rather marred by the slapdash nature of its decoration, a few shabby gambling tables in a corner, statues piled high in another, and crates stacked on top of one another, some of them glittering with gold and others with new weapons or potions. A treasure room as well as a command center - a vault, to keep an eye on all that is theirs. A showcase to display their wealth to enemies and allies alike - and for now, it seems, also a place for punishment.

The metal pathways are rusted, not entirely trustworthy even to a viera's light step, but that does mean they are well abandoned and provide a full view of the floor below. Fran counts out well over fifty men standing and lounging in a loose circle around a makeshift fighting ring, where two men circle each other with knives, a considerable amount of blood splashed across the ground, stains from where it has seeped into the wood and what might be a carpet, rolled up and set aside to be thrown over it all for fancier occasions. Fran wonders if they'd put it out when the Judge Magister had come here, when he'd told them of the destination and put the money down and bid them bring a viera along for luck.

"Come now, Esket, you thieving son of a whore! You had enough energy to stab me in the back, you ought to be able to do the same to your accomplice!"

Fran recognizes the man lording over it all, seated on an ornate chair raised up above the crowd. It must be Jacus - and he had been in Giruvegan. He had been the one who'd hit Ajra and dragged her away. Now with a fine overcoat and a high cut pair of boots, wine glass in hand, all the trappings of a gentleman poorly fitted on what is barely a man.

The viera spread out around her, bows drawn and arrows nocked, waiting for Balthier. Fran glances around the room, wondering which wall he is behind, if he's found what he is looking for. If those passages will be as abandoned as he'd hoped for - and then she is distracted by a wild cry, one of the fighters below finally dealing a killing blow. She does not know if it is Esket or his ally who takes a knife to the gut, down to his knees and then the ground. His opponent stands over him, panting for breath as the crowd yells and mutters around him, bets being paid out as gil changes hands, mainly annoyed at the end to their diversions.

"Well fought, sir!" Jacus calls from his throne, "we shall take it into consideration when delivering our verdict."

The only warning he gives, before raising a crossbow and shooting the victor through the heart, to hearty cheers from the surrounding men. It is clear to see among her sisters which have not seen this side of humes - Joce looks shocked, Ljen saddened - though Sije and Tyrn show no interest, barely shifting the grip on their bows.

"Open it!"

The bodies are quickly dragged backward, to the edge of what Fran realizes is a circle barely visible in the ground, approximately the width of the fighting ring, opening up before them. A storage space that might have held spare weapons, when it had carried soldiers, or spare silver when it had entertained passengers, but as the floor pulls away Fran cannot imagine where such a thing might come from, nor what madness would wish to keep it here.

Writhing shadows over twisted bones, that is all Fran can see, wrong in a way even the creatures in the Feywood had not been. At least those were alive, strange as they were, but with the pit comes a stench of such death, such unnatural existence - and she sees Aisa recoil, Tyrn's lip curling in an instinctive snarl. Nabudis - the broken thing feels like Nabudis, like the Strahl hanging at the lip of that decimated cairn.

Fran watches the dark lumps of flesh shift across its surface, dropping wetly to the ground only to draw back into its body, a creature poised at the edge of death but unable to die. It moves with hideous, graceless speed, letting out a wretched cry as it lunges up, talons scrabbling a few feet from the top of what suddenly seems a very shallow pit. Fran catches sight of what could be a beak, and for a moment it seems the nub of a wing might flutter against a distended spine before it drops back to the ground on four paws, and yowls. A keening, gaping scream that seems similar, if quieter to what they heard on their way inside - until the cry they _did_ hear answers it, loud enough to make the catwalk shudder beneath them.

If Fran finds it alarming, the brigands do not seem to think it so. The bodies are kicked unceremoniously into the hole, some of the men edging away from the pit but others fascinated by the wet, tearing sounds that quickly rise up, difficult to tell if the creature is eating - can eat - or is simply satisfied to tear the former crew to shreds.

Sije gestures for her attention, glancing once more to the sky above them, and as Fran looks up she knows they all share the same thought - smash the beams, shatter the glass and send it all crashing down. It could be done, if the spell were large enough, and it would certainly clear the room - and possibly take them with it. What Balthier would refer to as a brilliant terrible idea.

"Let's see, let's see… what else is on our docket for the night?" Jacus feigns nonchalance as poorly as he does humanity, "Ah, yes. Bring her out!"

Of course they had been looking for Ajra the moment they arrived, Fran half-certain she would be near the throne, or perhaps with the statues, displayed prominently as yet another trophy. Or this might be that as well, the metal cargo arm swinging out from the wall and Ajra dangling from the end of it. Bound by her arms and hanging limply and they have not closed the floor, suspending her only a few feet above the monster's snapping jaws at it leaps at her once and again. Fran would think there could be nothing worse to see - but the girl is so still, and does not panic or struggle or even raise her head. How many times have they done this to her? Every night, since she was taken? The mercenaries are whistling, cat calls and taunts and all manner of vulgar things, unaware of the arrows trained upon them, of how foolishly they seal their fate.

"Here we are again, love," Jacus says, a mocking smile on his face, "You know, I'd been told you viera were a bit more interesting than this. At the very least, I thought you might have a little bit of a fight in you. Give us all some sport."

Sije looks at her from across the span of the room, her intent clear - they cannot wait for Balthier, they must act _now_. Fran thinks it too, even as she looks across the room for her first target - and her eyes catch on a man moving slowly at the edge of the crowd, unnoticed by the others and casually making his way toward the other side of the room - toward the crane controls. He glances up at her - Balthier's clear, determined gaze meeting her own, and whether he had been unsuccessful or Ajra's appearance had changed his plan, this is the best chance they're going to get.

"No? Such a shame. I'll make you an offer - all you have to do is tell me where your fellow viera are, and I'll take you home to them."

Of course, of course - what does one do with a viera but look for the way to capture more? Tyrn is edging her way onto a broken bit of scaffolding, trying to gain the proper angle to put an arrow through the bastard's heart, though none of them can guarantee it. He is the leader, it would be better to take him first - but a part of Fran hopes he will not die so soon, that he might live to see what they will make of his little kingdom.

"Well, perhaps we might change your mind. Think about it - it's not as if you really need your legs to talk."

Jacus makes a gesture, and the gears whir, Ajra dropping an inch, two inches closer to where the creature snaps and roars - and then he looks over, menace shifting to confusion at the sound of what can only be the security doors sliding closed all across the ship, grinding into place, the room locking down one exit at a time. Loud as it is, the sound of the crane coming to a halt goes unnoticed - and there is no sound at all when the viera launch their opening volley, second arrows nocked and loosed before half of the mercenaries have even had a chance to look up.

It's not impossible for even the poorest man to learn magic, but real power only comes with time and training. A true skill to maintain one's focus in a firefight, and not for every man to learn. Of all these men, perhaps a dozen at best raise barriers, and this is no force joined by honor or allegiance - each man cares only for himself and nothing more. The defense is weak, their retaliation equally so, while viera spells and viera arrows rain down without mercy. Fran looses her third arrow before the first bolt comes anywhere near her, the ping of a bullet against her barrier a few moments later and she's seeking out Jacus with her next shot - the former Judge the only one with any real magical ability, the one who poses the greatest threat.

Fran finds him just as he finds her, and she grabs at the catwalk, throwing herself out of the way as the fireball roars through the space where she was standing moments before.

Sije is the first to empty her quiver, and turns herself into an arrow loosed, dropping from the catwalk to break her fall on the spine of a mercenary, sending him down to the ground and coming up with her claws in the gut of the nearest man. Howls of pain and rage fill the air, difficult to tell which are Sije's kills and which the men hitting themselves as they try to shoot at her. A few unfortunates are knocked off balance in the crush of the crowd, and tumble wildly into the pit, the beast within making quick work of them.

Balthier is still at the crane controls, throwing switches madly, fighting with a panel that appears to have jammed. All the noise seems to have reached Ajra at last - she is twisting now, trying to gain some purchase against the chain or swing herself forward, out of danger. All at once, she drops a few more perilous inches, screaming as the monster nearly catches the edge of her foot in its claws.

Tyrn roars in fury, and Fran realizes what she is aiming for in horror as Jacus steps forward and lines up a shot aimed right at the helpless girl. An arrow pierces his shields, grazing his shoulder and throwing his aim off enough that the bullet finds the chain rather than Ajra's heart, but Fran can see the links giving way, though, bending with the strain, and any moment they will snap and they will lose her forever.

"Sije!" Fran shouts, throwing one hand toward the sky, knowing she will be seen and understood even as she drops from the scaffolding. Hoping her sisters will find shelter even as she sees the growing brightness of their spells igniting one on top of the other, high above her head - and a sharp burst of crackling power that must be Balthier's own magic, finally igniting the blast that is more than enough to shatter glass and twist steel and bring the whole sky down around them.

Fran's boots hit the ground and she is rolling, crouched and running in that spare second of a thousand pounds of glass and steel suspended above their heads. She leaps, pulling the barrier spell around herself and Ajra even as she has the viera in her arms, the chain snapping free as they are both knocked to safety on the other side of the pit, and the world crashes down.

* * *

The first sound to come back to Fran is that of Ajra's breathing, the beat of her heart, and Fran feels relief and triumph even with nothing else known. Slowly, she opens her eyes, looking around at what remains of the room, a twisted wreckage of shattered cargo, blood on glass and men who can do little more than twitch and groan and breathe their last. Even the monster from Nabudis has not escaped unscathed, a great beam pinning it, splitting it nearly in two, and it shrieks weakly for a moment before subsiding into silence.

Joce and Ljen are with her in moments, helping Ajra to stand. Untying her arms and murmuring soft and gentle words, pressing close as if they can block out everything else but their concern. Fran quickly searches out the rest of her kin - Aisa is near, Sije making a careful check of the bodies as she passes. Tyrn had somehow managed to keep her perch above, only now making her way across the remains of the catwalk, beams hanging perilously at odd angles, to reach them.

Balthier moves into view, the most damaged of all of them with only burst of red on his sleeve, but by the way he's moving Fran thinks he's already healed it. He looks to her, and Ajra, and then to the other side of the room, behind a pile of broken statues, where Fran can hear the sound of someone trying not to make a sound.

"You might as well come out." He calls, anger laced through the dull bitterness in his voice. "I've sealed all the doors. No one else is coming, even if they wished to save you."

Silence, for a moment, and then Jacus slumps around the corner, limping slowly into view. Battered and bleeding, with an arrow in his thigh, though he's snapped off the end so Fran cannot see who made the lucky shot. He holds himself with all the disdain and pride he can manage, and Fran steps in front of Ajra when he dares to look at her. It makes him smile, and now, now is a good time to end this. Balthier murmurs a few words to Sije, and the viera nods and goes off toward the crane as he steps closer, leaning on a table that has somehow managed to survive the battle, glancing to the toppled throne and back again with a smile nearly as unpleasant as Jacus' own.

"Judge Malivar Jacus. Or what's left of you. I thought I recognized the name. Once a proud privateer under Archadia's colors, attacking Rozarrian merchants as you saw fit, running back to the Empire before they could catch you up at it. All that pillage and murder ignored, until you got greedy - or was it reckless, or stupid? Sinking a Bhujerban cruiser and thinking it would not come back to your door."

Jacus' eyes narrow. "Who are you."

"No one of consequence." Balthier says, blithely examining the papers strewn across the table, forged documents and stolen information. He seems unconcerned, and Fran knows it for the lie it is. "Now you have to bribe the Archadians to look the other way when you need to take a piss. What's the price of that these days?"

"One I'm quite willing to pay." The man's eyes keep flicking toward the far doors, and Fran can hear the distant sound of angry men, steel against steel. Trying to get in, perhaps fighting each other for the chance at a treasure that might now be up for the taking. Balthier only smiles.

"Wonderful safety systems on these old ships, you know. A bit simplistic but quite reliable."

Fran hears the mechanisms turn, as Sije gets the crane working again, and slowly the length of chain drops down.

"Listen," Jacus says, looking from it to her and then Balthier again, "you've obviously got what you came for. It's all business, that's all this is, and…" He takes a step back, only to find Tyrn there, and perhaps he cannot feel regret or remorse, but there is fear in his eyes now, skittering about even as he tries to cover it up. "We can work something out. You're not here from Archades, obviously - but that just opens up the possibilities."

"You took something from Nabudis."

"It was on the ship, the one they dragged here. It came after us - it _ate_ my crew. Some of my strongest-"

"You planned on selling it." Balthier said. "Hiding it from Archadia, and then giving it to the highest bidder - likely Rozarria, so they could study it, maybe make a weapon out of it. Except one day it… gave you a surprise, and so you decided to keep it nearby, to see if it might continue to prove profitable."

Fran looks from the pit, back to the doors, remembering that distant scream.

Jacus laughs, an ugly, nervous, sound - he's still looking for a way to get the advantage of this, even surrounded as he is. If he took the upper hand he would gladly kill them, or sell them, or torture them for what they've done to him tonight, for how they've wounded his pride.

"A surprise, yes. You might call it that - and yes, we kept it. Wanted to see how many more of them it might spit out. I don't remember there being a law against that."

"Only common decency. Well outside of Archadia's jurisdiction." Balthier says. "Why were you hired to go to Giruvegan?"

Jacus' eyes widen, not expecting the question. "Judge Magister Bergan, he'll ask us to do a job now and then. Archades may have thrown me away, but they still find their use for me."

"Why? What was he after?"

"You really think he told me?" Jacus snorts. "I'd eat my coat if it was other than Nethicite. It's all they talk about, it's all anyone talks about… what do you think I know? The coin is good. Bergan says he wants to go, I go. He says he needs men, I bring them. He wants a viera, for whatever reason…"

Fran flexes her claws, and he goes silent, though there is nothing like shame in his eyes.

"Did Draklor know about this? Does the name Doctor Cid mean anything to you?"

Balthier looks at him intently, and Jacus can't keep the slight smirk off his face, that he might have the upper hand even if there's nothing to do about it, even if it's only through ignorance.

"Just who are you, boy?"

Fran will wonder later if it all might not have ended there, even with Sije and the chain and Balthier's bitter rage. He looks back to where Ajra is still being held between Joce and Ljen, and his expression softens. She thinks he will motion to Tyrn to end the former Judge with a single swift blow and they will leave what is left of this place to rot. It feels as if they have already been here too long, and Balthier turns back and is about to speak when his foot hits a half-toppled crate under the table, enough to send it tipping forward, spilling its contents onto the floor between them.

The brightness of the moogles' poms seems garish in the wreckage, and more terrible with every moment she stares at them. Balthier cannot seem to look away, bending down to pick up a small, red puff that has rolled to the edge of his boot.

"You beat her. You starved her." He says, quietly, still staring at the pom in his hand. "You were going to torture her, until she told you where you could find her friends and her family. You were going to do this."

Whatever Jacus might say to defend himself, it disappears into a choked-off gasp as Balthier drives his fist hard into the man's stomach, and the man drops to his knees and then down to the floor, groaning in renewed pain from his wounded thigh.

"Chain him up." Balthier says flatly, and Tyrn moves to tie his hands. Fran goes to help her, her gaze on Balthier's back, his shoulders still set in silent fury as he goes to a panel in the corner of the room, calmly prying it away from the wall and calmly making adjustments and every calm motion full of nothing but violence. By the time Jacus has his breath back they have attached him to the chain, and he grunts as Sije lifts him into the air.

"You took it from the _Khiimori_, and somehow locked it into what used to be the ammunition storage," Balthier says, "behind the blast doors, so it couldn't break through. Even a dreadnought can't carry more than one set of those doors, though. If it got free, nothing else on the ship could stop it for long."

"What are you…" Jacus stops, as the answer comes to him. "You can't be serious."

Balthier does not answer, moving from one panel to the next. He pulls the pieces he'd taken from the radio out of his pockets, swiftly discarding the coat, and within a few moments the controls all light up under his hands.

The high, tearing scream sounds out as it did before - but closer now, much closer, perhaps accompanied by the sound of shrieking metal. Ajra lets out a soft cry, and Ljen and Joce quickly lead her away, tracing a path through the debris, Aisa covering their exit. Fran remains, with Tyrn and Sije - their sister is safe, this is Balthier's business, hume business now - but there is still a grim satisfaction to be had.

"Archadian Graylands base, copy." Balthier says. "Do you copy Graylands, over."

"It's the Grays here, south tower. Who's this on the signal?"

"Judge Bunansa broadcasting from a nest of bastards in one of the western canyons. I'm sending you the coordinates, over."

"What was that name?" Jacus says, and now his voice is high and tight with what's trying to be anger but sounds like fear, "what was that bloody name?!"

"Repeat that name, Judge," the radio says, but Balthier ignores him as well.

"I've got nothing but dead men here, Gray south. It appears as if they've stolen something from Nabudis. Big and dangerous and rather angry. I suggest you bring your best magicks and some long-range artillery."

Fran can hear shouting from the far side of the room now, behind the doors. The sound of shooting, of pounding feet and screaming and what may very well be the crunching of bone.

"Copy that. Repeat your name, Judge? We didn't catch it and-"

Balthier shuts off the radio. Jacus is still flailing against the chain, struggling to see behind him where Balthier stands.

"Who are you? Why the hell are you here?

"Rendering a verdict. One fallen Judge to another," Balthier says, circling the man. "I sentence you, Judge Jacus, to be yourself, for all the rest of your days." Balthier glances toward the door, the sudden thud enough to send tremors through the ground at their feet, and then another, and another, and the steel begins to creak under the strain. "A betting man might give you a full half-hour, but I doubt it."

* * *

They take turns carrying Ajra back through the Grays, and she breathes soft questions into Fran's ear - How long had she been captive? Are they all right? Fran can only be grateful, happier with each answer she can give. Ajra is weak and tired but not broken - she knows where she is and who they are and is not too frightened to speak.

The sound of engines reaches them perhaps halfway back to the Strahl - the Archadians, swooping down and they've found the hideout and perhaps even noticed the beast skulking about in its ruins. Or, Balthier says, they're simply too lazy to bother with anything other than firing from the air, and Bergan will be put out for the few moments it takes him to find another useful rat scurrying at the edges of Archadia.

An impressive display of their power, the glow of the burning ship lining the edge of the canyon walls in orange and gold for nearly a mile in all directions, though none of them wish to watch it for long. Balthier keeps well ahead of them, as if to grant them whatever privacy he can, though his words still echo in her mind - _one fallen Judge to another_. When they finally reach the Strahl he steps by to let them pass, and goes very still when Ajra's fingers catch and tighten on his sleeve.

"Thank you."

"It was nothing." Balthier says tightly, looking away, "less than nothing."

Sije sets their course, and they rise up out of the Grays, and no one looks back. Balthier has the wheel, and Ajra is swiftly tucked away in Fran's quarters, nestled against Ljen's side and sleeping soundly in moments. Fran sits down, stretching out in the doorway, and glances down the hall. Wondering if Balthier has fallen asleep, leaving Nono to watch over the Strahl, or if he is still awake, taking in the cool respite of an open sky.

For a while all is calm and quiet, and Fran rests and wonders when they all might gather together again, if it could happen for a kinder purpose the next time. They journey to the Garif now, on the open plains, a quiet people who move at a slow, steady pace and have always welcomed the viera. Ljen and Joce plan to stay until Ajra has fully recovered, until they have found a safe haven - and even as Ljen says it, it is clear none of them believe in such a place, not anymore.

"You are to return to your hunts and marks, then?" Fran says. Sije looks up, from where she'd been studying a string of carved beads, the wood clicking between her claws.

"I imagine there will be plenty to be had, from all corners," a flick of her ear, amusement and concern together in her voice, "Krjn did not know how one hume could command so high a bounty. I do not think they could raise it to what he is worth."

A compliment worth taking, and a warning she does not need, though Sije hardly expects her to heed it. "Balthier would put much more to rights, but he cannot do it alone."

"He is a gentle one, your hume." The words are soft, Ajra awake again and looking around the room with a curious smile. Little for her to see in this room that Balthier has not had some part in: jewels and glass, colored paper and priceless parchment - a tangle of chaos and civilization, wealth and trifle, sorrow and anger and joy that is strange and precious and uniquely, incomparably Balthier.

"He has our honor in him," Sije agrees, "I hope he may keep it in the days ahead."

* * *

The ship touches down. Fran sees her sisters off, and does not bother with the cockpit, or Balthier's quarters, making her way down through the length of the Strahl to the main engine room instead. An unexpected welcome, when the heavy door creaks open under her hand. It wouldn't have been difficult to pick the lock, but this is his place of solace and the first time she has sought to enter it, and there is a good deal to be grateful for, to be invited in.

The main engine bay is a rather small room, thick with Mist and lit by the flickering blue of the skystone, the soft hum of powerful magicks a steady constant in the air. Balthier's tools and weapons are strewn haphazardly across the floor, lying where they were dropped, and she follows the short trail to the pair of boots sticking out under the engine's core. All the work there is painstakingly delicate, a place he might escape to think about wires and tubes and nothing more, and he knows she is there, so Fran waits.

"A man can't help but wonder," he says, carefully, "no matter what he wishes to believe, that maybe great Archades knows of what it speaks. A title cannot merely be abandoned, and being born into that world is more than just coincidence and good fortune. Maybe I cannot simply wash my hands of it, and pretend..." His voice is odd, echoing from beneath so much metal, and hoarse, weighed down with pain. "It is impossible to avoid being complicit in it, you know. No avoiding it, not completely. Every Judge has his price, there's no getting around that. I did, I certainly did, even if it was never for… even if I never… but who knows? I had barely begun. Who knows what a handful of years and the wrong circumstance might prove? Who knows what part of that is still in me, and I do not even know it, will not see it until it is far too late."

"You could never be that man, Balthier."

He laughs, unhappily, still safely ensconced in the heart of the Strahl. "You call me that, even now. I am grateful for it, Fran, more than you know. I would like to think…" he pauses, and it lasts one heartbeat, two. "A sensible man would understand if you wished to part company, and even I can see the reason in it."

"Do you believe I would have done any less to those men? Do you think we would have let any of them survive? If they did not wish to die they never should have touched her."

"She will recover?"

Fran nods. "Our lives are long, and Ajra is yet young. The others will stay with her, and see that all is set to rights. She will be safe, and we will all be more careful in our dealings with empires."

He does not answer, and Fran tips her head, listening for what she cannot hear beneath the sound of the engine. The catch of his breath, the unsteady beat of his heart.

"You are not responsible for the actions of other men, Balthier. However much you might wish it so."

"_Wish_ it…" He says, suddenly harsh, drawing himself from beneath the engine to look up at her, rising up to sit with his back against the engine and always that look, that there is some secret - always some secret - that will break everything. A judgment she is supposed to bring down on him, and her refusal only causes more pain. His voice is rough and rich, full of all things - mockery and bitter pride, wistfulness and scorn and awe.

"My name is Ffamran Mied Bunansa, first son and heir of House Bunansa. My father is Cidolfus Demen Bunansa, head researcher and founder of the Draklor Laboratories." All this the truth she has learned for herself, but now Fran knows what it sounds like to hear him say it, how heavy the inheritance and how far he wishes to fling it away. "My father built the airships that won them Nalbina. He is the one to inflict Manufacted Nethicite on all Ivalice. He is the one… House Bunansa… _my_ House is to blame for the destruction in Nabradia, for the slaughter and desecration of Nabudis. I let it happen. I let it all happen."

"The Midlight Shard. You knew it before anyone else."

Balthier grimaces. "My father was looking for the Sun-Cryst, and acquiring the Shards was the best first step. He was determined to possess them, and yes, I knew it - I knew before _Vayne Solidor_ did. I do not know if it was by his own hand, or if he drove Nabudis to some act of desperation, but…" He has never said the words he is about to speak, but Fran can tell they have always been with him, worn down in deep grooves in his most private contemplations, "If I had killed him when I had the chance, Nabradia would still have her capitol and her monarch… and a future. Dalmasca would still be free."

Does he expect her scorn for this? Fran tries to imagine killing Mjrn or Jote in any circumstance, for the worst of crimes. Let alone for what had not yet happened, for an evil that still seems nearly beyond comprehension.

"I do not think I would wish to know such a man, who could murder his father in cold blood," she says, "You did not know what would happen in Nabudis. You could not have imagined it."

"I should have." He raises his hands and lets them fall, a helpless, frustrated gesture, "I could have done… I _should_ have…"

"You tried."

Cruel of her, perhaps, to keep offering forgiveness when he wants condemnation, but Fran stands her ground here in his last sanctuary, silent and determined. He looks to her, and to the floor, and perhaps then to some inner horizon. She tells herself it is the light that casts such a pallor on his skin - he is overtired, this has been a trial for them both and she wants nothing more than to go to him but some inner certainty keeps her where she is. An instinct, that this is the moment, it is here or never, to accept what he knows is true or never stop running.

Fran watches, Balthier silent and still - and then, mercifully, comes the moment when he wavers, and buckles, and finally relents. A weary shake of his head, because she is persistent and his partner and because he loves her, and trusts her more than anything, more than himself. He rubs a hand across his face and stops, smirking a little at the stubble he finds, that persistent reminder he obviously has no need for.

"When I was young, I admired my father above all men. I thought he knew everything - about airships, about the world. It seemed wonderful that he was always so busy. Always important, even before… I thought I would grow up, and we would build a ship like the world had never seen and we would travel all of Ivalice. He and my mother and I." Balthier shrugs, but the false nonchalance is barely tatters now, worn clean through from too much use, "I don't know if he ever really loved her. I don't know if he loved either of us."

Fran has lived among humes for so long, and yet there are things she still cannot find the sense of. Joys and tragedies that never happened in the Wood - there is simply no name for what Balthier is, what he has done so far beyond what she might call exile. What his father, his kin have driven him to… there are no words at all.

"Do you know the last thing my mother asked of me before she died? To give him her apologies. Dear gods, he'd left her to die and she was only sorry she could not live to see him home - that she'd _interrupted_ his _work_." Balthier slams his fist against the floor once, twice. "Knowing he'd abandoned her - she was terrified, half-gone with fever and she'd still… oh, the bastard. The absolute bastard, that she should die _begging_."

He does not strike out again, but every muscle is tense, even the slightest gesture badly strained. "The research always came first. _Always_. Before his family. Well before his dying wife. After that, well - I learned the true cost of all that… genius. How little he cared for anything he could not take apart, could not see in pieces under his hands. Answers for the sake of answers, no matter the consequences or who must suffer for them."

"You have always sought the Sun-Cryst. It was the reason we went to Rabanastre."

"Finding a single Shard would have been bounty enough, I did not lie to you about that. I thought it would be enough to check Archades, to be the rogue element they could not predict, to slow them down - but yes, the Sun-Cryst has ever been the goal. We must find it before they do, we _must_. You've seen well enough what my father is capable of when left to his own desires. The Nethicite is all he cares for. All he loves. If Giruvegan did not make him heartless, it surely made him dangerous."

So that is the reason he'd followed on that path so desperately, seeing no other option. Balthier sees her think it, and nods.

"The good Doctor got himself inside the city, years ago. It's where he learned of Nethicite. Where he started his long conversations with… I don't know, phantoms? Spirits? Muddled delusions that call themselves gods. I still can't figure how he stepped past the gate. I had hoped, perhaps, if I could get inside… but it seems the madman's son receives no special attention."

"What does he wish to gain?"

A betrayal of Balthier's anger to consider it, even for a moment - but Fran can't help but remember the portrait on the wall. The wife that Balthier swears had been so callously thrown away - but they had seemed happy there, in that picture. A proud husband with his loving family - or perhaps all portraits in Archadia are painted so, no matter what the truth may be.

"The mad don't need reasons. It is why they are mad," Balthier says bitterly. "No, I am not giving him enough credit. My father is quite complicit in his own insanity. He did not fall into this. He kept his eyes open and his head high, with an emperor's son there to cheer him on. What should Vayne Solidor care if it destroys the man, as long as it gains him the power he desires?" He flinches slightly, his voice rough. "I speak as if it hasn't already happened. The princeling indulges the lunatic, and so my father talks to the air for hours and designs an end to all things. Whatever their intentions, Nabudis speaks plain to the result. Archadia cannot take the Cryst, no matter the cost."

Except he does not know where it is, or even where the Shards are, Balthier working with nothing more than fragments of a story where he is not the leading man, where he cannot seem to even reach the stage. It speaks in every weary line in his body, in how low he bows his head.

"I am so tired of this… damned, cursed _helplessness_. I don't know what to do, Fran. I don't know how to make it right. It's why I took the Strahl and ran, that I would be free to do what was necessary. I would right the wrongs my House sought to unleash upon the world, to stop them before he could… before… and in the end all my foolish struggle has saved no one."

He does not move, when she settles herself beside him, her fur rising a little this close to the engine but Fran is used to the Strahl and the way the Mist sings within it. She rubs the backs of her knuckles against his arm, and if her eyes were closed she would think him made of the same metal that surrounds them.

"I believe Ajra would disagree."

Ajra, and Sije and all her sisters - and a hundred others, all those strangers he has played the hero for and their gratitude is hardly without value. Balthier looks up, and his eyes are the dark color of the Wood's deepest glens, its most shadowed, quiet places. He leans against her, and Fran curls around him, holding him close, the tips of her claws light against his skin.

"I cannot ask you to follow me in this, Fran," he finally murmurs, hot breath stirring the fur at her throat. "One does not cross swords with House Solidor and expect to walk away. I know very well where this will likely end. For all the world, I would not see your neck beneath Archades' steel. To know that it was I who led you there."

"As you led me to the Feywood?"

"I didn't…" He stops, and laughs a little, relaxing against her, "… and I told myself at the start, I _swore_ I would take none into this lunacy with me."

"I did not leave the Wood that I would be untouched by the world." Fran says. "I am with you, Balthier. Whatever the path, wherever it might lead."

He nods, just a little, and for a time it is enough just to sit there in the quiet together - truly together now, and stronger than ever before. Fran does not lack confidence, but there is no need for false bravado. She does not know if they can win this, to survive and see what lies beyond, but simply knowing they will meet it, that they will fight is enough. It has always been enough for her, to meet the future with weapons drawn and ready, and she is not afraid.

"Come to bed, Balthier?"

The only answer is a soft snore, and Fran sighs, smiling a little as she draws him closer.

* * *

No secrets left between them, so now and then Balthier will make some mention of his past, and the better memories of that former life. All the races he'd been in as a young man, the records broken and the engines burned clean through. His time as a Judge, and the constant annoyance he'd been to his superiors and his teachers and the men under his command. Even then he'd had the instincts of a pirate, asking questions before throwing punches and buying a round before either of those, when he could. The Judges had not thought much of his strategies, but it had gained him allies and informants he's used to this day.

Balthier was practically raised by moogles, he says, his father simply bringing him along with his books and tools. He'd been passed from one perch to the next, resting him on benches and worktables and in cockpits for convenience until someone threw together a mobile of spare parts to keep him occupied. They'd even built a little pair of wings at one point, rigged up with a skystone so he might hover safe and out of the way. Only a fragment, but then his father had made some modifications - always refining the concept - and _then_ they'd spent the better part of an afternoon trying to pry him from the rafters.

It is true, as he'd said in the beginning, that the crew take their cut of the spoils, that they find the Strahl a fascinating vessel to practice on, but now Fran knows it is more than that, the moogles as loyal as she is - it's difficult to know who Balthier truly is and be anything else.

It still doesn't explain the morning, some weeks on from the Graylands, when Fran wakes up to the sound of a steady, high-pitched squeaking echoing faintly down the corridor. It lasts for at least five minutes before Balthier rolls over, one bleary eye peering out from where he's thrown an arm across his face. He is not a morning person, at times barely an early-afternoon person, though when he blinks his way into better alertness to see her watching, his affectionate smile is warm as the sunrise.

An expression that quickly falls into a puzzled frown, and he sits up quickly, as if it might somehow answer the question for him.

"What on earth is that noise? One of the aft drives slip out of place?"

The strange, chirping cry is not one of the aft drives. Or an unexpected imbalance in a glossair ring. It is not even a door in need of mending. At some point in the night, it seems the Strahl has welcomed a new member to its crew.

"Kupo po… po," The baby moogle says, reaching out with its paws to grab at its own feet and successful in the attempt, though it knocks itself off-balance doing so, slowly tilting onto its side despite the struggle of tiny, newborn wings. "Po po po… kupo?"

It doesn't have its pom yet - those grow in as they get older, perhaps at six months, or even a year. A special day for celebration when they finally 'bloom' and the color means something, though Fran can't quite remember exactly how it goes.

"So, this is… Well…" Balthier says, the moogles all drinking tea and watching him blandly, two of them still lazing in bed with engine manuals and all equidistant from the child playing on the floor. None of them seem the slightest bit interested in providing an explanation or claiming ownership. "How did you… no. No, wait - I withdraw the question. Permanently. Gods, it's too early for this."

Fran moves past him to crouch down over the baby, who looks up at her - and up, and up - in wide-eyed astonishment.

"Kupo!"

"Yes, you're adorable." Balthier says distractedly, still staring between the moogles. "When exactly did you plan on telling me one of you _isn't_ a bachelor?"

No one bothers answering that question, and the spluttering half-argument that follows only lasts until Balthier is thoroughly exasperated, the moogles are completely amused and a few more gil pass quietly between them. One more bet paying off in someone's favor, though Fran can only imagine the terms.

A happy marriage at sea follows in due course, and if Balthier's status as ship's captain is outweighed by his status as lawless rogue, the moogles have their own paperwork already filled out as suits their guilds and clans. The ceremony is simple but beautiful, high above the clouds, with Balthier in a coat he'd stolen from a Rozarrian nobleman and Fran holding the baby moogle who clutches a bundle of flowers that are quite lovely up until the moment it discovers they are also quite edible.

"I now pronounce you man and wife. I hope. Unless you changed places when I wasn't looking, or you're already married. To other moogles. You would think I should know how this works." Balthier waves a hand vaguely. "And this would be the first time I've _kept_ anyone from living in sin. Everyone kiss someone, please, and let's open a case of wine."

Hours later, Fran wanders past the small common room and the small bench there, usually full of spare ship parts or books. Balthier is stretched out, one hand behind his head and his eyes closed, and the baby moogle sleeps on his chest, letting out the tiniest of chirps with each breath. Fran leans against the wall and watches them, well-contented.

"We are to Balfonheim for the honeymoon, it seems." Balthier says without opening his eyes. "A chance to show off the newest member of the guild to kin and kind. There is to be a proper naming. You are invited, of course."

"Is it a boy or a girl?"

"I refuse to ask, and Nono will not tell me. So we stand at stalemate," he says, "I don't suppose you viera have any special tricks for this kind of thing?"

"Have you tried bribery?" Fran says, and steps closer as the tiny moogle yawns, and blinks - and attacks Balthier's fingers as the pirate dangles them over its head, swiping at them with tiny claws, and nibbling with a vengeance when he finally manages to catch one.

"It's weaponized cuteness, is what it is. One day the moogles will take proper advantage of it, and we'll all be ruined. We just won't care." Balthier says, and there is the pause that means he will tell her what is troubling him, if she but gives him the space to do it. "I told them they could leave. Offered an out, the way I did when I first took the Strahl. I told them… a child… it changes things. It ought to."

"If we do not do this, there will be no safe place for anyone."

"Nono said as much, and the others agreed with him. I ought to have argued, and yet…" Balthier says, and sighs. "I had told myself it was the best way, to go it alone. I would not hesitate, and I could risk it all because I risked nothing - but this… I believe it may be an easier thing to fight for the future than against the past."

"Kupo. Po po." The baby adds solemnly, before rolling over so Fran can scratch between its wings with a clawtip, trilling with delight.

* * *

If one is going to steal from the Royal Palace of Rabanastre, there are few worse times than on the eve of the new Consul's arrival. The Archadian guards will be on their highest alert in two years, and rumors abound that any who wish to assassinate Vayne Solidor will have to queue up for the privilege. It is an event that any sensible sky pirate would take great pains to avoid, and indeed most with the faintest hint of a blemish on their record have once again decamped to Balfonheim or the seedier ports of Rozarria until the whole business sorts itself out.

Yet Fate is ever fickle, and Fortune will demand her tithe, and so it is with not a week to spare and just before dawn that Balthier receives an ornately scripted missive revealing exactly where the Dusk Shard has been tucked away - in the dead center of the palace vaults.

"I could have sworn we were there. In that very room. We must have walked right past the damned thing." Balthier says, studying the map, the description of the statue, his mouth set in a grim line. "Once Vayne has the leisure to examine those vaults in full, Archades will have their hands on a second Shard. I think they've had enough fun with the first."

Fran frowns, sliding a claw across the edge of the page he's set on the desk. A simple note, and unsigned. "A strange windfall, or perhaps a curse - but why is it ours at all? Surely, if this were true, there would be far more coin in passing the information directly to Archades?"

Balthier laughs slightly. "More coin, perhaps, but not the Shard itself. I imagine the hands that rendered this note were not those who ordered it written. We are but a proxy for a proxy, for one who does not wish to catch the Lord Consul's eye."

Fran knows what he knows, and how little comfort there is to be had in it.

"Bhujerba."

"A piece of the Dynast-King's legacy would buy Ondore considerable leverage, with Archadia and Rozarria both. Nabudis must have unnerved him enough to make it worth risking." Balthier has not looked up from the papers, and Fran is sure he is already thinking about how best to plan this attack, for any hope of success. "Perhaps it is merely a coincidence, that his agent chose me. Duke Delalsiri, I believe. You can tell by the way he loops his l's together."

Fran knows full well, Balthier does not believe in coincidence any more than she does.

"You would think if you were truly meant to succeed, this duke would have given you more warning."

"Well, I did sleep with his wife."

Fran stares, more out of habit than surprise. Balthier shrugs.

"The party was dull and I had no pressing engagements. It seemed impolite to decline."

Easier to ignore it and move on than to bother tossing him out a hatch. They have been partners far too long now, Fran would be obliged to go retrieve him.

"Ondore knows of you, and what you are to Archades?"

"He does like to keep informed."

"Enough to know we have no intention of giving him the Dusk Shard?"

The sun breaks over the horizon, and Balthier grins the way a man would who knows nothing for what hangs in balance, how powerful the forces allied against him and how fast and hard they will strike. If Fran did not know him, she would think him but a reckless fool - and not the King of All Reckless Fools, who knows this gamble to the last gil. If Bhujerba's invitation is not simply a trap to make him look good for Archadia, or some kind of diversion while Ondore launches his true plan elsewhere, then certainly the Marquis has no intention of allowing them to hold on to the Shard for long. Ondore would never allow them to bring such a useful weapon to neutral ground, to make a pledge for peace with the price of skystone for new airships, new dreadnoughts and frigates rising by the hour.

As if the sages at Bur-Omisace will be enough to even stop what has happened, what _is_ happening, Archadia and Rozarria at the cusp of all-out war. Fran knows the moment they find the Dusk Shard there is not a power in Ivalice which will not seek to take it from them, and not a single safe port they will have to hide in. It is not a power they can use, save to seek out an even greater one, with no idea who might stand guard at the Sun Cryst's gates, or what they will do if they do manage to reach it.

Insanity by any measure, and there is no other course to chart.

"You have to admit, Fran," Balthier says, turning the ship south, toward Rabanastre, toward Vayne Solidor and the vast unknown, "no matter what happens, it will make for a magnificent story."

* * *

1. Obviously when I say three parts what I mean is nine.

2. The name 'Graylands' I grabbed from Vagrant Story, one of the best games ever made. Also the snowflies.

3. I made Balthier an only child because no, Squeenix, you don't get to pretend to make the game more complex in the supplemental notes, not in a game where family, caste and political ties are paramount. You also don't get to give Ashe eight (?! srsly?!) brothers. Just… just no.

4. Does anyone else find Balthier's reveal of his past in the game to seem bafflingly shoehorned in to no useful dramatic effect? Yeah, this fic is apparantly 50,000 words of /I sure do/.


	25. the law of probability 1

It's almost a relief to be kidnapped, for Penelo to know that she has been made a prisoner because Balthier has escaped from Nalbina, along with his comrades. Which means that Vaan isn't dead, isn't lying in some dark corner of a crumbling dungeon, with his skin drying to paper - and she stops herself from thinking any more about that. Vaan is safe.

Vaan is alive.

So Penelo can murder him.

Far easier to be furious at him than frightened for herself, for what might happen when she is no longer useful to the bangaa who have captured her. In Bhujerba, still subject to the laws of gravity at its edges, there seems one obvious possibility, so it's much better not to consider that, either. Penelo clenches her hands into tight fists, gazing around the tiny room for the unexpected escape route she's looked for a dozen times already. It's infuriating to be so helpless, not to be able to let anyone know where she is or that they're walking into a trap. Hoping only that the man they're looking for, this Balthier is used to such a welcome. Sky pirates! Of course Vaan would get himself tangled up with sky pirates, and on the very night someone had tried to kill the new Lord Consul. It was nothing short of a miracle that they'd considered him only a common thief, that he hadn't been executed on the spot.

Migelo had come home absolutely beside himself, certain that there would be swift retribution for all Rabanastre, and Penelo had been up most of the night doing her best to console him, trying to hide her own worries, that he might very well be right. She'd been the one dealing with the merchants and neighbors all night, one after another seeking news of what had happened, what was going to happen, keeping her expression calm and her tone reassuring despite the growing dread she'd felt. Finally, there had been a brief moment of quiet, to sneak away to Lowtown and make sure all was well - but Vaan's bed had been empty, and Penelo felt a cold chill sear through her then, sharp and fast as a pistol shot, and she knew then exactly what he'd done.

The handkerchief Balthier gave her is a wad in her hand, so wrinkled it won't be of much use to anyone if - when - she can return it. He'd probably kept her alive with the gesture, Penelo knows that now. Stepping in between her and the soldiers. Stopping her from doing something so incredibly stupid, when everything from Lowtown to the palace had been a blur and she was so certain she would see Vaan's body, or _worse_. That they would execute him then and there - the Judges can call trial at any moment, and deliver verdicts instantly - and Penelo knows she would have rather died with him there, that holding Vaan's hand and facing the end together would be better than moving forward alone.

Hasn't she given enough? When will it be _enough_?

Difficult to tell how much time has passed in her small cell, as she goes from frightened to oddly bored and then back to fear again, her heart thudding in off beats whenever the scrape of clawed feet go past the door. The manacles they clamp around her wrists are meant for bangaa, or much larger humes at best, and Penelo's certain she could slip them off - but not get past the padlocked door as well, let alone sneak away from an entire pack of bounty hunters when she's not even certain where they've taken her or how far she'd have to run to get away.

It had been a long time in the air once they'd snatched her off the street, and then stumbling with a sack over her head and actually fighting to keep the chains /on/, so that they didn't clank to the floor and anger her captors, those thick-taloned fingers tight enough to bruise around her arms. Penelo thinks they even noticed her struggle, but it only made them laugh. She is both bait and temporary distraction, and at one point they even bother to 'feed' her, though the overlap between bangaa tastes and those of humes is not much to speak of. The offering is a joke, amusing them briefly while her stomach growls, but enduring petty cruelties has been familiar territory for years.

It had been a surprise, of course, when they'd said Balthier was on his way to Bhujerba, and Penelo wonders what he's really coming for. Likely to deal with these bounty hunters, and naught to do with her, but Penelo still remembers his eyes in Rabanastre. The way he'd made sure to hold her gaze, and promised Vaan's return. Kind eyes, and it was so unexpected Penelo's sure she remembers it right. If she keeps out of the way of this fight, if the sky pirate survives there is no reason to think he won't just let her go, or even bring her back to Rabanastre.

_Take me with you._

The thought hits her unexpectedly, and hard. Harder even than the fear for a moment, though Penelo knows it to be foolish and impossible and there's no way she'd ever ask - oh, but this is exciting, isn't it? The first thing she's done in years - or ever, really - that anyone would actually want to hear about.

The door opens, and all the bangaa pile at once into the room, what she thinks now might be a whole family of bounty hunters. No matter where she looks it's Migelo's voice, quietly dismayed at the state of their clothes or the haphazard chains and hoops piercing ears and mouths, or both at once. The spiked ornaments, the too-bright sheen of their polished skin - he has always found such things a gaudy, unnecessary display, and thinking of his fretful disapproval is the only thing keeping the fear at bay.

"Get up."

"What's going on?"

The hand closes around her arm, dragging Penelo up off the floor even as she tries to comply.

"We've got what we need. You're of little use to us now."

"W-what are you going to do?" She's not certain if she means to Balthier, or herself, or if she even wants an answer. The head of their group has already turned away, no longer interested in a captive hume with the real prize in his sights. The manacles fall from her wrists, but before Penelo can think to appreciate it she's dragged forward, moving among with the pack of them down a long, dimly lit hall, and roughly thrown along another, smaller corridor. Released, though she is still frozen in place, wondering if they plan to hunt her down, if she is to be some sport until the pirate arrives.

Their leader growls, rounding on her.

"You try my patience, girl. Run, or die. It is little difference to me."

Penelo runs.

* * *

Of course they're not stupid enough to send her anywhere that might cross paths with Balthier, but as Penelo runs she wonders if there's a way to reach them, to warn him. Did Vaan find a way to tag along, did he convince the pirate not to just cast him loose once they'd left Nalbina - either way, Penelo still owes him, although at the moment there's not much she can do about it.

The corridor is lit sparingly, and she moves as quickly as she can while watching the shadows at her feet. No sound at all, even when Penelo stops to listen there is only her own breathing echoing off the featureless stone. A wider passage opens up ahead of her, a few more lights and a track laid into the ground - a mine, then. She shivers at the thought of so much stone around her, of not having a weapon to speak of, but the few carts she finds are empty and there's not so much as a pickaxe in sight. Luckily, there seem to be no creatures prowling about - this is a well-used place, which means if she follows the tracks she will eventually find someone, or be found.

Penelo doubts very much that anyone will care about her story on its own merits - a kidnapped street girl is a novelty, just ask the bangaa - but the miners might not be so happy to learn the bounty hunters are using their workplace for a hideout. It might be enough to help Balthier, might be enough that they'll consider her useful, and then Penelo can ask them for the cost of a ride home in return for her help. Even a message to Migelo would be enough - he'd send her the money for a ticket, wherever she might be, if not find her a merchant she could just tag along with.

There's light ahead, and Penelo runs into it without once considering what it means, that the bangaa had said Balthier had left Rabanastre for Bhujerba, that she must be in the skystone mines. It makes perfect sense but it just doesn't connect, doesn't come together until she's breathing in a fresh breeze that's far colder than anything that blows through the desert. Until she's out of the mine and her legs lock up in shock at the sight, and it's all she can do to keep her feet.

Oh.

The path beneath her is not the floor of some cavern, but a bridge. An open-sided platform, suspended over the skies.

_Oh._

For a long moment, nothing else comes to mind, and Penelo presses a hand hard against her chest, over her heart to keep it there. It aches, bruising itself badly trying to escape, to leap right out of her chest and sail off into the dawn.

Slowly, she takes the few steps off the cart path, climbing her way up onto the platform. A short railing, and then there's nothing beyond that but a world she only remembers in fleeting glimpses, memories so precious and so few they might as well be dreams. It stops her breath entirely, the shifting blues and greens of the sea, all silent and beautiful with the dappled light-and-dark of clouds passing overhead, Bhujerba itself leaving a great shadow on the waters below.

Wisps of those same clouds blow past and cling to her, a wet sheen sticking to her skin and Penelo trembles and keeps her hand at her chest and tries hard not to cry. It's just like she remembered. It's just like she wanted it to be.

At the horizon line, Penelo strains her eyes and thinks she might be able to see the thinnest, dark ribbon of land, out in the furthest distance. The whole world, she can stretch out her arms and her fingertips and it's the whole world right there, all her own.

_Don't go home. Don't go don't go don't go._

She could stay. She could find work here. The hardest part is over, it's /getting/ to the island that's the trick - and some mad, wild part of her would even thank the bangaa for it if she could. Maybe she could find Nia and her new husband and beg for help, just enough to be pointed in the right direction. Of course she'd be illegal, of course she'd have to hide from the guard but how was that any different than in Rabanastre?

Penelo's hands find the railing and clutch it, tightly - _don't go_ - and she takes a breath, and another and it's still an effort to pull away. Drawing herself back from the sky and out of such silly fantasies. Foolish girl, wasting time here when Vaan is in danger, when Migelo must be out of his mind with worry. It's a stroke of luck, being in Bhujerba, and that's what matters most. Now she can be certain this is no abandoned mine and they will not be pleased to hear of bounty hunters laying traps, whatever their quarry.

She keeps her thoughts on that, of how she's going to do the right thing, of the story she must tell and how to make it sound believable and not how it hurts to leave the sky behind, to duck back into the tunnel, back into the caves. Maybe they will thank her. Maybe they will let her walk around Bhujerba just for an hour, just for an afternoon, until they send her home for good.

"You! Girl! What are you doing? Stop there!"

Penelo shouldn't run, of course. It's what she's been looking for, isn't it? Someone to tell, someone to warn, and by any measure of common sense she ought to stop, to tell the story she's so carefully prepared. The problem is that the voice startles her badly, that she's spent the last two years running from anyone who sounds that angry, especially when they sound that angry in armor - and as Penelo risks a glance behind her, still not certain she ought to be running, she sees that it is a very familiar set of armor, indeed. An Archadian soldier, and once she's started running from them there's really no way to stop.

"Catch her, damn it!"

The shadows help her escape, along with her lack of armor, making her faster, making it much easier to dodge. More than once Penelo twists away from a hand that nearly has her, listening to them stumble and curse her and gasp for breath. Spells blaze up in the darkness, flashes of light and heat but she darts forward, unscathed, moving swiftly away from where they're now cursing at each other.

"Where did she-?"

"Did you get-"

"No, you got _me_, idiot!"

Penelo almost laughs at the clang of what has to be a soldier's glove off a soldier's helm, and in a few moments more she's near what has to be the entrance to the mines. She can see light again, and certainly there will be workers, a foreman - someone here who isn't an Archadian. Penelo will be able to catch her breath and explain what's happened and it will all be -

All a misstep, a moment of foolish optimism, the sort of thoughtless action she's always chiding Vaan for, and so of course everything comes undone. Penelo runs out into what she realizes, too late, is the full, blinding light of day, and when she hits the man she cannot see they both tumble hard to the ground. Voices shout in surprise and alarm and Penelo's trying to scramble back, to blink away the light as she hears footsteps - too many footsteps - all around her, and even before her vision clears she's sure there's no escape.

The man she'd knocked down is much older, and Penelo hopes she didn't hurt him even as she keeps looking, taking in the fine fabric of his coat and the jewel at his throat, the edge of a noble crest and _oh Penelo, what have you done_-

It isn't much of a surprise when armored hands drag her roughly up off the ground. Soldiers all around her, no sign of anyone else, and she can only imagine what she's fallen into.

"Marquis? Sir, are you all right?"

"Fine, fine." He waves away the much gentler hands trying to assist him, studying her as he gets to his feet. His expression is neither cruel nor kind but carefully neutral. The face of a man who has been in business for a very long time, to what Penelo soon remembers is considerable success. This is none less than the Marquis Ondore, ruler of all Bhujerba.

_You're in for it now, Pen…_

"A Dalmascan girl in the Lhusu mines? Quite curious, indeed."

Penelo's mind races, searching for the right thing to say, for anything to say. She's stepping back, not quite realizing that she can step back, that the soldiers holding her have let go and there's no reason for them to do that unless they're sure she's not going to get away. Unless there's something behind her to keep her where she is.

Penelo's back bumps up against metal, solid and unmoving, and she turns, and looks up and then all she wants to do is be anywhere, _anywhere_ other than this. Better to be with the bangaa back in the caves. More merciful for the Marquis to throw her right off the edge of his beautiful city.

The Judge Magister stares down at her, though she can see nothing of his eyes behind the helmet, only darkness.

"Who are you?"

His voice rumbles at her from that abyss, and Penelo can't help the tiny sound of fear that escapes her, and of course he blocks out the sun. Nothing but power, a force that cannot be run from or fought against or reasoned with. Indomitable, and inevitable, the perfect symbol for an Empire that has crushed everything she's ever known without even taking notice. In her nightmares, when she thinks of her brothers dying on the field, when she thinks of her parents on some distant plain breathing their last, it's the Judge Magister who delivers the final blow. Penelo's never seen him before, but he's always been there.

The other soldiers stand perfectly straight, and no longer seem frightening at all. "We found her, milord Gabranth. Wandering around in the mines. No sign of Lord… of anyone else."

"What are you doing here?"

He does not raise his voice. He does not have to. Penelo tries to speak, opens her mouth and tries but nothing comes, and tries again and still nothing. Maybe if he would stop staring down at her, but he does not move and she cannot speak. The morning light hits him but does not reflect off his armor, not even on the tips of the horns that curve down toward her. He wears a blue cloak, almost the same color as a dress her mother owned, years and years ago. Penelo cannot remember what it is she is supposed to do.

"Answer the Magister's question, girl!"

"Judge Gabranth," the Marquis says smoothly, "I do believe you may have frightened her voice away. Look how pale she is. Whatever business brought her here, it seems unlikely to have anything to do with-"

"Kidnapped." Penelo says, barely a whisper. "I was… there was… the bangaa, and…"

She can't mention Balthier, she can't mention Vaan, not now, not to him - but even the few words she's spoken are the wrong ones, that much is clear. Obviously the very last thing she ought to say as Ondore's lips thin out into a grim frown and the Magister… it ought to make no difference, when she cannot see his face or his eyes but there is a weight that settles on him regardless. A subtle change in the air and she has made a terrible mistake and whatever he thought before he is /angry/ now.

Penelo remembers once when she was young, finding a mouse curled up dead near their front door, with no sign of how it had died. Father had said it must have been scared, so frightened its little heart just burst. So frightened she can taste it.

"You will tell me everything."

Ondore is the first to look up, toward the opening of the mine, but Penelo can only hear half the words he says - "well… seems… no longer be necessary" - and then the Judge Magister has stopped looming over her as well, following the Marquis' gaze. Penelo thinks, in a moment of perfect, certain panic, that it's Vaan there, that he believes he's come to rescue her, and she turns to scream, to tell him to run away - but the boy walking out of the mine isn't Vaan at all.

* * *

1. It wasn't Gabranth in Bhujerba in the game, of course. I promise the story will only drift further from canon from here.


	26. the law of probability 2

The boy has dark hair that falls just a little past his shoulders, and a slight build, perhaps only a year or two younger than Penelo herself. His shirt is so tattered and worn he might pass for one of her neighbors, though Penelo doesn't think they have places like Lowtown here, and there's still the problem of the way he moves. He does not carry himself like a boy, let alone one in rags. Far too much confidence to be the owner of those clothes, and bafflingly unconcerned for someone who is steps away from a Marquis and a Judge Magister. Penelo can't help but stare.

"If you wished for a tour of the mines, Lord Larsa," Ondore says graciously, "I would have been quite happy to arrange one."

Lord Larsa. Well, there's her answer. Bhujerban nobility, perhaps?

"I apologize, Marquis," the boy says, with the smallest deferent nod, "it was never my intent to raise an alarm. I simply wished to get some air, and I fear my curiosity got the better of me."

"You should inform me before you step away from your cortege." The Judge Magister says in that low, empty voice, and all Penelo's blood goes cold again, but Larsa looks back with a practiced innocence.

"If I inform you, Gabranth, then how am I to step away?"

Calling the Judge Magister by name, without hesitation or fear - teasing him, if such things are possible. No, probably not Bhujerban. Which makes him Archadian. Which means it's probably time for Penelo to start panicking again, and it's probably a good idea if she just doesn't stop.

Larsa leans a little to the side, looking around Gabranth, and it takes Penelo far longer than it ought to realize he's staring at her. All of a sudden, she doesn't quite know what to do with her hands. Penelo raises them toward her hair only to pull them quickly down again - she's a mess, top to bottom, more than a simple smoothing is going to fix. Of course her father had taught her all the right etiquette for greeting the very wealthy, the most powerful - but not exactly under these circumstances.

"We found her wandering the mines, milord."

Penelo ought to be scared, a promise in the Judge Magister's voice that he still wants answers, but Larsa has not stopped looking at her. A thoughtful expression, and a rather mischievous smile in his eyes. For her?

"If it is a crime to wander on one's own... then I, too, am guilty."

Before she can think or say a word Larsa is there, taking her hand. Penelo instantly regrets hours of cheerful work done without proper gloves, and every single time she's ever bitten her nails.

"I believe you are right, Gabranth. I shall not travel unaccompanied any longer." He looks to Bhujerba's lord. "Marquis Ondore, I thank you for your hospitality as always. I believe I shall press onward with the new day, though, and see how things fare with the Lord Consul in Rabanastre."

Ondore makes a slightly surprised sound.

"I have heard there was some… difficulty there, during the welcoming celebration," and with that, Penelo knows exactly how far the Marquis prefers to understate, "I would not have you put yourself in danger."

"Nor would I," Gabranth says, "nor would the Lord Consul."

"Truly, it will be all right. I promise to be quite careful. Besides, it seems I have found a guide," he says, and pulls her away, his next words soft and meant for only her. "That is if you will oblige me, Penelo?"

He looks at her as if he wishes nothing more than to take her into his confidence. Penelo thinks it would be a very easy thing, to be in his confidence, this noble Archadian stranger who somehow knows her name.

"O-of course," she says, for the lack of any better idea, and lets him lead her away.

* * *

Penelo is the responsible one, the one who looks for tomorrow's problems before they start, the one who scolds and frets and she had never meant to be this way. Never wanted to be the one who shunned adventure, who swept up dirt and minded children and split her time up each day in a hundred different ways for a hundred different people, giving herself out like matchsticks until nothing remained.

It's more than just the relief of being rescued. It feels like the return of some part of herself she hadn't thought she could lose, and instead of being frightened Penelo finds she is quietly delighted as they walk a narrow path that tucks in and out of the edge of one of its many neighborhoods. With no one to worry about but herself, it seems she just stops worrying.

Bhujerba disarms her with its beauty, the lush trees planted along grassy walkways, private gardens peeking out through stone arches, and she wishes to walk down every narrow street and live behind each door. The buildings wind in and around each other, stacked together on terraced paths, wedged in wherever the space will allow. The shape of all Bhujerba is defined by the enormous spires and spines of Magicite that rise up where they will, like the scales of some enormous, sleeping beast, near-transparent and breathtaking against the backdrop of the sky.

Penelo's certain there have to be more people living here than in Rabanastre, but she only hears the occasional rise of voices from behind high walls, small markets and squares all tucked away in careful corners. The street they are on is mostly secluded save for a stretch of trees full to bursting with white flowers, petals scattering all around them and from there blown off into open space, quickly disappearing from sight.

A curve in the path ahead, a small outcrop - and suddenly all Bhujerba lies before her, airships of every make and size criss-crossing through the skies and the city bustling below. Full of men and women from all ports in Ivalice, on their way to parts unknown. In the distance, Penelo can see great mansions seemingly perched at the very edge of the islands, all but suspended in the air. She counts out half a dozen ships she hasn't seen in ages, and three or four she's never seen at all before she realizes she's got her arms around herself, holding tight, and Larsa is watching her in concern.

"Are you all right? At this height, it can be difficult to adjust to the change in altitude."

He thinks she's afraid. He thinks this is about what happened in the mines - as if Penelo can stand here now and even remember that, or keep any other sensible thought in her head. She feels giddy. Maybe it is the air.

"I'm fine. Thank you. Thank you for everything."

A proper lady would likely curtsey, but Penelo is about ten minutes too late to start being proper and Larsa doesn't seem to notice the difference.

"I would have shown you the Marquis' estate, but I think he is not well pleased with me at the moment," he says.

"And you are not sorry for it." Penelo replies, before she can stop herself - but he only laughs a little.

"True enough. I imagine - oh, but you're hurt." He says, reaching for her other hand. Penelo is surprised to find he's right, her knuckles scraped from the fall and her wrist red and raw where the manacle had dug into her skin, though she hadn't noticed either until now. Or the fact that every inch of her is coated in grime.

"It's nothing, really. I can just…" Buy a potion with the gil she doesn't have, from among the most expensive markets in Ivalice. Right, Penelo. Sure.

Larsa is already casting, as if she needed any more reasons to think him noble. An unskilled healing spell will sting, if it works at all. A decent mage can manage a cool, lingering numbness, and this is what Penelo's familiar with, the very best that she'd thought magicks had to offer. When Larsa calls up his spell, though, Penelo feels nothing at all but the brush of his fingertips against the back of her hand, but a moment of his concentration and the pain is gone and her skin is mended.

"Is that better?"

Standing so close, his eyes are nearly the same shade as Bhujerba's shadowed seas, and that's not fair. It's just not fair at all.

Penelo quickly shifts her gaze to somewhere, anywhere else and her eyes catch on a glint of light in his ear - a stud, both ears pierced with small and perfect pearls. One of them could keep her and Vaan and half of Lowtown fed for the year, easy. The set could probably buy back her home. He notices her gaze, and raises a hand to one ear with a grimace.

"Well, that does much to explain it. Overlook one detail and all is for nothing. I did spend some time thinking on this disguise, truly."

Penelo does not have the heart to tell him how poorly it all suits him, that his magicks and his manners do far more harm than any trinkets ever could, no matter their cost.

"At least the missing button stands in your favor, milord."

Larsa lifts the rumpled cuff, picking slightly at the thread. "I borrowed these from one of Ondore's gardeners. I ought have it mended before I send them back - and please, it is Larsa. Only Larsa. I am not overfond of formality."

"Larsa, then."

"Penelo."

Maybe she should have thought of some alias, but it's not her fault he called her by name first - and Penelo likes the way he says it, she can't help herself. In those Imperial tones her name sounds like some other girl's. A girl with mysteries and secrets, the kind with some wondrous, hidden reward. The only secret Penelo can think of is how a week ago she was up to her knees in a sewer, taking out a troublesome nest of rats herself when Vaan had gone missing again, and that's one she's taking to the grave.

"It was Balthier who found me out. Your friend was with him."

"You saw Vaan? Is he all right?"

"We were separated when the bangaa attacked, but their ambush did not go at all as they had planned," Larsa studies her for a moment, "Vaan was very worried about you. He said you'd been kidnapped from Rabanastre, to serve as bait for the sky pirate. Quite the ordeal."

He says it kindly, and Penelo knows he means it, but there's the tiniest, wistful interest there that turns 'ordeal' into 'adventure' and she can't help but roll her eyes.

"What _is_ it with boys?"

Larsa lifts his hands sheepishly, though his eyes are bright and impish again and Penelo almost pities the soldiers assigned to keep watch over him.

"I did not mean to make light of it, I swear. I am glad that you are safe, and I would very much like to escort you home. Until then, I shall see that you're kept from harm."

He isn't joking. Maybe Larsa's using her as a convenient excuse to go to Rabanastre - he did seem excited about the prospect - but the promise of protection is quite honest and given his status, completely within his power. Once again, Penelo finds it difficult to meet his gaze.

"I… thank you."

Perfectly ineloquent, but when is the last time she's done anything remotely like this? Kidnappings were one thing, but it isn't nice to spring polite conversation on the unprepared.

The road finally draws away from the edge of the cliffs, winding its way back towards the city proper, though Penelo thinks this is a bit more than the regular visitor to Bhujerba gets to see. Judging by the houses she can glimpse though the gates, massive palaces set back behind high stone walls, they are now in the wealthiest part of town, and the guards standing here and there do seem to confirm it. Penelo gets a few odd looks as they pass, and Larsa a few more, but no one stops them. Maybe it is Larsa's demeanor - or more likely the shadow trailing them. It is an accident she notices him at all, a brightly-colored bird darting past and Penelo turning to watch it go - and there is the Judge Magister, keeping what seems a polite distance but no more, his gaze fixed on them - on her.

She wonders if he's ever surprised anyone to death. It seems likely.

"We are being followed," Larsa says wryly, when he notices where she's looking. "It's all my doing. I can't tell you the last time I managed to slip away, and Gabranth does not take such… failures lightly. It will be months, I'm certain, before I'll get anything like another chance."

Penelo's rather sure it _isn't_ Larsa's fault, that the Judge Magister is more interested in every move she makes. As if she needs the warning, and there's something tugging at the edge of her thoughts, some memory or lesson of what it is Judge Magisters do besides command and kill and scare everyone witless all the time, but Penelo cannot quite remember it.

"Just how did your friend find himself in the company of sky pirates, anyway? Is he a part of their crew?"

Oh, Penelo is sure Vaan is doing everything in his power to join up, though there's no telling how successful he'll be. It isn't that he lacks skills, exactly, but just think of the look on his face should he be asked to swab a deck or oil a piece of machinery or any number of tedious, messy tasks she imagines even sky pirates can't escape. Vaan lives for the gleaming ideals of things, for the way they ought to be, only to toss them aside the moment that reality threatens to dull the shine. It's not his fault, not really - what has real life done for either of them but take things away?

Still, Penelo does not think it will be so bad if this dream is brought a bit closer to the earth.

"No, he was…" and she pauses, not at all prepared to tell the Archadian noble how Vaan had been stealing from the palace. Larsa might enjoy sneaking out unattended, but there was no telling how far his lawless sympathies would stretch. "I'm not sure, really. I only met Balthier for a moment, I'm surprised he bothered to come after me."

It's the truth, not all of it but more than enough to see her through.

"It would be a sad sky pirate, would it not, to ignore a damsel in distress?"

Penelo frowns, still a little embarrassed at how easily she was captured, how she'd been snatched up _and_ tossed away like some half-ripe Tomato. "Especially one he put there."

"I imagine sky pirates have a knack for that, as well. Still, it has given us the chance to meet, so I do owe him my thanks."

Larsa's being polite, nothing more. He'd say the same to anyone, so Penelo's not even _thinking_ about anything like blushing. Or turning away with one of those silly, coy, girlish smiles she certainly can't pull off, a tilt of her head that would likely look as if she'd developed a neck cramp. It's the altitude. It's turned her stupid.

"What were you doing in the mines, anyway?"

He glances over his shoulder, and shifts a little closer to her, obviously trying to keep the Judge Magister from seeing the bag he draws from his pocket.

At first Penelo thinks it's a stone, vaguely egg-shaped with blunted points that curve together at one end, almost like a flower about to bloom. A dull grey, but as she looks closer she can see it is not a stone, at least somewhat transparent though quite scratched and dull. If it were only a crystal, it would be of little value, but if it were Larsa would not look so intrigued.

"Manufacted Nethicite," He snaps his fingers, and Penelo gasps as the flicker of the spell leaps from his fingers, drawn instantly into the center of the crystal. It glows for a moment, before going quiet again. "It absorbs magickal energy. I ought not to have this out of Archades - it is quite rare still, but one of the scientists in Draklor believed Bhujerba was attempting to sell them magicite from a weaker vein. Flawed crystals can cause devastating reactions during the transformation process, and if it such a thing were true... Obviously, it would create an incident to confront the Marquis directly, without proof."

"So they sent you?"

Larsa makes an odd face. "I may have… taken it upon myself to act as a… interested third party, on a mission of diplomatic goodwill."

"You stole it and snuck in."

"I did leave a note," Larsa says, "and I am happy to say it seems their suspicions were unfounded. The magicite they are mining is of a perfectly high quality, as it always has been. If anything, I believe the Marquis might be cutting too deeply into the best reserves, in order to make his profits while he can."

"How so?"

"Magicite is but stone when its power is gone, and so Bhujerba has always had its steady dominance in the markets of Ivalice. Nethicite, though, can be recharged, reused - eventually we will have skyships that never need new stones, and no one will need worry about the Jagd again. It may not be the case that Bhujerba's fortunes will alter so greatly - but fears do not need to be true, for men to act on them."

"Archadia…" Penelo says, forcing herself to continue before she loses her nerve, "the Empire would not go to war with Bhujerba?"

"No." Larsa says immediately, "absolutely not. Manufacted Nethicite is yet a young science," he shifts the stone in his hand, and it seems so odd how it does not catch the light, "you would not believe the work and the price involved in this small piece alone. Even then, even were such a thing perfected - no."

"Bhujerba is too valuable to lose." Penelo says quietly, and she knows business enough, can see the truth plain all around her. The Skycity has leverage that Dalmasca did not, but there's no reason to blame even an Archadian noble for that, for what no one could change.

Larsa notices her tone, his eyes dark and solemn with apology - funny, that he should care so much for a stranger's feelings. "I did not intend…"

"No. I meant nothing by it, truly," she says, and smiles as best she can into the awkward moment, as he carefully slips the Nethicite back into his pocket.

How strange, that such a trinket might do so much harm.

* * *

The Skygrounds are as beautiful as the overlooks in their own way, with wide and roughly cobbled streets marked here and there by large fountains, and merchants and shops stretched from one end to the other, all the tables piled high with goods. If Penelo closes her eyes, it's like Rabanastre before the war, before Nabudis disappeared and took half of Nabradia and nearly all the markets with it, Dalmasca's strongest trading partner vanished overnight.

Penelo wonders what the rents are selling for on the street level- they must be high, if not inherited positions, carefully guarded - but she bets they get plenty of tourist gil, and the sky island would be first pick of the goods coming in from Balfonheim and all the ports. Bhujerba doesn't tax Rozarrian goods the way anything coming into Dalmasca is sure to get hit - sometimes two or three times over - and that's why she smelling real, actual coffee as they pass by the open-air cafe. Rabanastre had been forced to roast all sorts of nonsense since the Empire rolled in, none of it worth mentioning let alone drinking. Penelo has no taste for the stuff and it still makes her mouth water.

If only she'd known she was to be kidnapped, she would have taken some extra coin and brought back souvenirs.

All eyes are on them as they pass, because Gabranth has moved much closer now that they're in the crush of the city. Or it would be a crush, save that his presence leaves a bubble of space on all sides, and they trail whispers in their wake. If Larsa notices any of it, he makes no sign - it must be common enough for him, though Penelo can see why he would come to enjoy sneaking away.

Above the shops and bustle of the streets are many homes, small apartments with thin balconies and shutters mostly closed to the busy streets. Penelo imagines they will open by nightfall and she cannot imagine how beautiful it must be here at night, between the lights of the city and the stars in the sky. Larsa hasn't asked yet, but it's rather obvious she's never been here before, and he keeps mostly quiet while Penelo tries to see absolutely everything without slowing them down. Imagining herself behind every window - the top floor would best, to open the shutter wide in the mornings and look out over the rooftops to the rest of Bhujerba, where the green spaces and spires of Magicite nestle like cut gems in careful settings.

At the crossroads of Travica Way, they are forced to stop for a parade of sorts, a long line of chocobos donned in racing silks headed from the aerodrome to some racetrack on the other side of the city. Penelo is interested, the birds from as many different ports as everything else they've seen and all cleaned and groomed to gleaming perfection. As happy as she is to watch them pass, there is no denying Larsa's keen interest, his expression a mixture of careful calculation and what might even be envy as he watches each bird go by. He watches them for so long that Penelo wonders if they're about to take a long detour toward the track.

"You are fond of the races?"

Larsa lets out a sigh that almost sounds wistful. "I am fond of racing, though it is rare that I am allowed these days," he says, glancing back at the Judge Magister, "it has been decided I am too reckless in the saddle to be trusted there."

"You broke your arm," Gabranth says, and Penelo notices a few people behind him taking a few more steps back. "If you had been going any faster you would have broken your neck."

"If I had gone any slower I would have had had no chance at winning," Larsa says, but he seems resigned enough to the Judge's verdict. "I do raise them as well - I have a Sunset Gold who just hatched her first egg, not long ago. I was worried, I acquired her from a very hard life, and I did not know how she would handle the strain, or if the chick would survive. Luckily, they are doing quite well…" Larsa trails off with a sheepish smile. "Forgive me, I am rambling now."

How does Penelo tell him that this is the first conversation in recent memory that hasn't only been about what she can do for someone else. Or how to make ends meet when she's not even sure she can find both ends. Or why Filo and Kytes were running around Lowtown howling like two mad cockatrice, the former with a bucket on her head and the latter dressed in one of her very old skirts - and oh, how she'd begged them not to explain themselves.

"Do you keep many birds, or is it just the two?"

"I have seven, at the moment, although I am rather keen to acquire an eighth. A beauty of a Rozarrian blue, long feathers, an amazing stride, good disposition too."

Penelo tries to keep her expression mildly interested, hiding her shock. She'd already known his status, a stable full of chocobos here or there should not surprise her so, even though - _seven_? With his eye on an eighth? Gods, to keep them in food alone…

"I have heard tell they have many fine birds in Dalmasca." Larsa says, "do you ride?"

Penelo remembers laughing and swinging the reins, the excitement of her father lifting her into the saddle of a tolerant old bird. How strange and wonderful the world seemed from so high a place. He'd never done much business with birds - only saddles or greens on occasion. Penelo had still learned the basics of riding, a few lessons he'd traded for here and there, because he'd wanted her to know everything there was to know. He wanted her to learn refinements 'past her station,' so that she might stand here now and meet Larsa as an equal - and Penelo misses her father, misses him and loves him more than ever for such a foolish, beautiful dream.

"Not… not as often as I'd like to."

With the parade past, they are finally on their way to the aerodrome - not so markedly different than Rabanastre's own, if larger and obviously much better financed. The street changes shape again, now paved with tiny, colored stones at the gate, and as they step inside Penelo has to fight the urge to turn back, to spin around and try to take it all in, and bring some small piece of the city with her. A memory that would not fade.

"Our chocobos are smaller than those in Archadia, I think," she says instead, to distract her from any further melancholy, "at least those that the soldiers ride."

"Ah, our cavalry birds? They're a very special breed. The Rozarrians have a similar type - they prefer the obsidian bird to our gold, but the thinking's all along the same lines. It gives them the broad chests, the extra muscle power to support the weight of an armored rider at full tilt, while still wearing armor of their own." Larsa's off and running now, Penelo doubts she could stop him if she tried, "Their legs are shorter too, more maneuverable. A racing bird could blow right past them in a sprint, of course, but the cavalry's got much better stamina for a longer fight. Oddly enough, you know, they aren't as sharp-eyed as other birds. It's not anything they bred for - some fault that showed up along the way, but it means they don't tend to spook as badly in the middle of a battle and… I am certainly rambling now. Again. Forgive me."

Penelo laughs a little at Larsa's chagrin. It's fun, to hear someone so passionate about something that is less than deadly serious, that is not war or suffering or the uncertain future. All of this has been a great deal of fun, and though she is certain he will forget her as soon as they part, Penelo knows this will be a story she'll be telling for many years to come.

If she must leave Bhujerba so soon, at least she will likely be doing it from the private compartment of a Skyferry, unlikely that Larsa will bother with less. All she needs to worry about, then, is how to keep from making a fool of herself over every little luxury on the way home. A chance to slip into a private washroom, with a sink and a few towels to get the worst of the dust off, and she might even be presentable for the rest of the voyage.

It's surprising, then, when they walk right past the ferry terminal, and Penelo knows where they must be headed, though she can't quite believe it. It's one thing to dart through Rabanastre's aerodrome on business: moving through the busy commercial sections among the clunky masses of trading ships, counting up deliveries and making sure Migelo's schedules are running as they should be. It's another to walk along Bhujerba's silent walkways, places where no one goes because only a select few have the coin to be here.

It makes sense, really. It's perfectly logical that there are more Archadian guards here, that the Judge Magister steps forward to give them orders and there is a crew ready to depart. Why wouldn't a boy who knows the Marquis and keeps a stable full of chocobos have his own private airship?

A stunning sight, there's no other word for it - even docked among the other private craft, surely the most elite in Bhujerba, there are none that compare. Penelo won't say she's any kind of expert, but this ship has been crafted with enough care that she doesn't have to be. Even at anchor it seems ready to alight, with arcing golden wings that descend its full length in one long, sinuous curve. The glossair rings spin gently in their holdings, nestled near the stern in what seems a too-delicate embrace. Penelo is certain that's an illusion - there is real strength in every line of the gleaming body, a grace and an elegance like no ship she's ever seen. Maybe Larsa is not allowed to charge ahead on a chocobo whenever he wishes, but this is no meager compensation.

"Do you like it? The Balius was a gift from my Lord Brother. I am told that she is quite maneuverable at extremely high speeds due to… some feat of engineering I must admit I do not understand. Very quick, but very secure, I assure you. My brother can be rather… diligent when it comes to my safety."

At this point the feel of her heart jolting to a halt ought to be routine, as she catches sight of the ship's mark, the sign of ownership, pale gold against the cream color of the hull. Subtle enough, but once she's seen it she can't stop looking. Penelo has seen that sigil before in Rabanastre: the dual, twining serpents. Quite recently, in fact.

"… your brother?"

"Yes," He looks at her as if surprised by the question, and that's exactly the moment Penelo remembers what she'd been thinking of, the final task of the Judge Magisters: bodyguards of the Imperial line. "My name is Larsa Solidor. The Lord Consul of Rabanastre is my brother, Vayne."

* * *

Author's Notes-

1. Some dialogue taken from the game in this section.

2. Penelo is 17 as in canon, and I'm making Larsa slightly older than he was in the game, just over 15, so that he gets to be a slightly more active character and so I can get to some of the romance without having to do it post-game. Because, really, the Dalmascan peasant girl and the Imperial prince? _Obviously_.


	27. the law of probability 3

The _Balius_ is as much a work of art as a skyship, both outside and in, with all considerations made to elegance and beauty and vast views of the open sky. Penelo runs her hand along the smooth bend of a beam that would have been overlooked in a lesser ship, here rendered in dark and elegant tones, with decorative whorls and loops where it connects to the ceiling. Through the window the clouds have parted, and she sees that the endless blue of the sea has already given way to grays and greens, what will soon be the golden vastness of Dalmasca's sands. The ship is very fast, but Penelo can still but barely feel the engine, only the softest hum beneath her feet. All else is still, and quiet and calm - at least on the outside.

Penelo had let herself be led on board, still too stunned by Larsa's words - Larsa _Solidor's_ words - to even consider another path. All too late it occurred to her, as the doors closed and the ship pulled away from the skycity that there was no one left around her but soldiers, and the Judge Magister, and if anything were to happen here…

"I regret I cannot give you a bit more in the way of proper luxury." Larsa says. "It is a bit of a bachelor's ship, and not often pressed into a lady's service. Still, I should make myself a bit more presentable before I am to be properly scolded. I would offer you the use of the guest quarters as your own for the journey."

The most gracious way possible of saying she smells like a dead hyena, and Penelo might want to do something about that.

"Yes, please. Thank you," she says, aware that she's just tossing all her politeness out at random in place of actual etiquette. It will be to her benefit to put a door between herself and the rest of the world for a while. Let the day wash off her skin, collect her thoughts and not make any more of a fool of herself.

No surprise that the ship has a private suite for Larsa, with extra rooms for his guests, or that such people wouldn't think that air travel - or anything at all - ought to come with lowered expectations. So the bathroom alone is easily the size of the space she shares with Vaan in Lowtown, with a smaller antechamber of its own for dressing and undressing. Well-heated, so that there's no chance to catch a chill, and there is even a chandelier hanging above her head, crystal drops reflecting the light.

"It has a chandelier," she says aloud. When's the next time she'll be able to say anything so absurd? "A chandelier in the bathroom of Vayne Soldior's little brother's airship, because I've gone _insane_."

Sky pirate nothing, just let Vaan try to top this.

Penelo flinches as she finally gets a boot off, and what seems like half the dirt from the mines comes pouring out with it. Hanging her filthy, sweat-soaked clothes up only makes them seem all the more irredeemable, and she doesn't relish the thought of having to crawl back inside of them later. The few crew she'd seen not in armor had been wearing simple uniforms, perhaps she might beg the use of one until they reached the city?

Until they were back in Rabanastre. Her home. Vaan's home. The new Lord Consul's home, or what remains of it now that the smoke has cleared.

Larsa is not just Vayne Solidor's younger brother, but his only brother. At least the only one still alive, or so she'd heard. The rumors had flown fast and hard in the week leading up to the Lord Consul's arrival, when half the city was certain it couldn't be him and the other half certain it meant they'd be wiped off the map in short order. Among the rumors were those that said there were once two other Solidors. Brothers who had stood between Vayne and the throne and he hadn't cared for that at all. It simply wouldn't do.

The Archadian soldiers had laughed at many of the wilder stories and added badly needed facts to others, but they had been oddly quiet about the suggestion of fratricide, offering complicated explanations that never quite seemed to reach absolution. The truth of it, or so they said, was treason, two brothers cast down for threatening the realm. As much a personal strike against House Solidor as a matter of state - but the Emperor had never seemed all that grateful, and Vayne had been so very quick to prove his loyalty with blood.

Penelo's heart thumps, and she takes a few slow, deep breaths in the silence. Completely alone here, at least for a moment. Taking in the wide room with its gleaming fixtures, her bare feet against the cool stone of a mosaic, countless tiny slivers of marble inlaid into the floor. The pale green serpents of Solidor stretch across the whole of the room, bordered in a dark, glittering circle of another stone she can't quite place. Her dazed mind is estimating prices anyway, and even at the depth of an eighth of an inch - any more would be too much weight, even for a ship this size - but the quality of the stone and the size of the design, together with the hours and hours of craftsmanship, the way her toes can't find a single seam, even among the tiniest details…

She doubts she will see anything more impressive - at least until she reaches the shower, and what Penelo soon realizes is a limitless supply of hot water.

It's been six months since she's had a hot bath, and that a gift from Migelo for her birthday, purchased at a very fine price. It pales in comparison to this, as Penelo leans against the wall and lets the water pound across her shoulders and down her back, the steam rising as she turns the heat as high as she can bear. Larsa had apologized for the lack of luxuries, which means there's only a handful of soaps to choose from in brisk, clean scents, instead of whatever ludicrous, flowery cache makes up an Archadian lady's daily regimen.

She spends as long as she dares under the water, not wanting to see who might be sent after her when Larsa grows tired of waiting. At the last moment, Penelo turns the tap to cold, just for the bracing jolt of it, and then she's clean and dripping all over that marvelous floor, wondering how many towels she can use before someone lodges a protest.

Maybe Larsa thinks she's Dalmascan nobility, kidnapped for some reason that's actually sensible, and that's why he's being so nice. It will be a shame, when he figures out he's been carting around a nobody all this time - but she got a shower out of it at least, and there's no one who wouldn't set that deal in her favor.

Squeezing the water from her hair, Penelo quickly braids it back up, stepping into the antechamber and reaching for her clothes. It takes a moment of clutching at the fabric before she realizes what she's holding. The outfit she'd come aboard in is gone, right down to the boots, and replaced with - bafflingly - a pair of sandals and a traditional Dalmascan dress, with the darker under layer and the yards and yards of loose fabric to be tied up and wrapped into place. It's rather amazing they recognized it at all - most Archadians mistook them for tablecloths when they went to the markets. It's been ages since she's even touched one, impractical for the hauling and running and loading that makes up most of her days - and Penelo and her mother had sold the best of theirs long ago.

She rubs the fine weave in between her fingers - moogle work, it has to be for the size of the stitches, and gods, the _cost_ of it - and Penelo realizes they must have gotten it at one of the stalls in Bhujerba, maybe even one they'd walked past, that she'd made some slight mention of. It seems absurd, but there's no other explanation. In the time it had taken for them to prepare to launch, Larsa had one of his men run back to the markets and buy her an outfit to wear home. It's even a similar shade of yellow as her own clothes, trimmed in brown with tiny topaz beads that glint and sparkle and make her glance back up at the chandelier.

Fancier than anything she'd used to wear, even in the best of times. Vaan would say it was no more than her due, only the tiniest portion of what she truly deserved. No, he would think she ought not not to accept any gifts from an Archadian, not when they'd taken everything to begin with - but Larsa did not attack her home, no matter who his brother is. He didn't do that then, and he didn't need to do this now. Whatever else has happened, or what Penelo knows of the Empire, this is a gesture of kindness.

Carefully, she winds the fabric around herself. Remembering the way her mother chided her in lessons long ago, and the feeling of her hands on Penelo's own, making sure of each tuck and fold. How impatient Penelo had always been to be finished with it, annoyed to have to learn how to wrap herself up in what she didn't want to wear anyway. All those memories are quiet and sweet now, and as she looks in the mirror Penelo thinks her mother would be pleased, that this is not such a bad way to present herself to anyone, even the son of an emperor.

Larsa does not disappoint, waiting for her in the main room of the ship and once more dressed to match his station. He'd been sitting near a small table, maybe waiting for her, or perhaps she'd interrupted his work, but he smiles when she appears, and quickly stands. The Judge Magister is near the door that Penelo assumes leads to the bridge, perhaps trying to be unobtrusive, though there is no place in the world such a man could go unnoticed.

"Ah, good. I hoped they had found the right shop," Larsa says, "The dress is to your liking? I think it suits you quite well."

"Y-yes. It's lovely. Thank you."

Penelo takes a seat opposite his own, the table between them set with two cups for tea, though just the sight of it leaves her queasy - too many nerves still, with no idea of just what's to come. Larsa shuffles through a few more papers, making some final notes with a quick stroke of the pen before setting them to the side. He reminds her of some bright-eyed bird, taking in all the world, absolutely everything that might prove interesting, and it is almost intimidating to have his full attention fixed on her.

"I have been wishing to visit Rabanastre. My Lord Brother gave a speech, and despite what came after, I heard it was quite well-received. Did you see it?"

Penelo remembers sitting on the stairs in the plaza at the palace, and all those pretty words the new Lord Consul had said about peace and unity, about defending Dalmasca. She remembers the applause, and Vaan going stiff and angry beside her.

"I did."

"He is an excellent speaker. I have oft listened to him practice, when he is in need of an audience… and sometimes, even when he is not," Larsa smiles for a moment, but it fades, "I have been assured he is all right, of course, but I… I would like to see it for myself."

Penelo intends to make some noncommittal noise, something amiable and inoffensive. The _least_ she could do is be polite, but instead she discovers Larsa is staring at her with that worried gaze again, and looks down to find she's wringing her hands as if she were still clutching Balthier's handkerchief. It remains with her clothes, which have probably been long since tossed out the airlock, and she can only hope the sky pirate has a spare. Certainly, he must - no doubt Balthier has a daily quota of handing off tokens to young girls.

"Are you all right?" Larsa says, because she still hasn't said a thing, "Forgive me, I thought you knew who I was."

"I should have realized," Penelo says, and he had been able to disguise at least _that_ much from her, for a while, "I only saw the Lord Consul at a distance, but there is a semblance between you."

The best thing she ever could have said, as Larsa smiles brightly. "I would like to think so. We are but half-brothers, truly. The first Empress died when Vayne was young, and my own mother lost her life giving birth to me."

"I'm sorry."

Larsa shrugs, "I never knew her, apart from what my brother has told me. He has never treated me as if we are anything less than family. I had very much wanted to be there, to see his first speech as Lord Consul, but my brother bid me wait. He said he wished to focus fully on Dalmasca, on mending what had been so badly sundered. My brother - my brother is not one given to failure. Perhaps things aren't going as well as they might be… but give him a little time, and he will put things to rights," he nods, and there is only fondness there, nothing but confidence and trust. "Be not troubled. My brother is a remarkable man."

"He frightens me." It slips out unbidden, and Penelo barely manages to keep from wincing as Larsa frowns, though he seems surprised, ever concerned even when he could claim the right to anger.

"Why?"

"I'm sorry. He is your brother. It's just - you don't understand how much we lost to the war."

How much she'd lost. Everything. Everything gone, and how easy it would be for the Lord Consul to wave his hand and sweep away all the pieces that remained. Look how fast Vaan had found himself in peril, and how close Penelo had come to losing him forever. A stroke of mad luck and a sky pirate to save him this time, but what about the next time, or the one after that?

"You fear the Empire."

It's an insult to say yes, and a lie to say no, one she knows Larsa will see right through. Penelo drops her eyes, and whatever she's expecting to happen next, it is not to find Larsa there before her, gazing back.

He's down on one knee, looking up at her - and Penelo remembers what had come just after the Lord Consul's speech. Remembers Migelo bowing low before the Lord Consul only to have Vayne crouch down, helping him back to his feet, clapping what seemed like a friendly hand on his shoulder. Except that it made no sense at all, no less impossible than what Larsa is doing now. The sons of desert chiefs with but two chocobos to their name would never think to lower themselves like this, not even for a moment, let alone a boy who might one day hold the throne that rules half the world.

"Listen to me. The men of my family, we are taught to place the needs of others before those of our own. I will see that you are kept from harm. It is my duty to House Solidor. I give you my word, and I swear that my brother would do no less."

The best Penelo had ever thought to hope for was to go unnoticed. The Empire is not leaving, whatever Vaan wants to dream of, and when he speaks of rebellion and revolution it's so hard for her not to get angry. He's _lived_ it, he's been there beside her through the worst of it, and yet he still thinks there is some way they might win. Did he understand it better now, after being in the palace? Watching the Ifrit rain down fire as if it were nothing, untouchable and unstoppable and destroying everything in its path - does he still believe they can fight back against that?

It is not the hero's dream, not good enough for Vaan, but all Penelo wants is to _live_. If they are quiet and careful and fortunate they might all manage to slip past, somehow. Stay alive long enough to build some small, new future in a better place than Lowtown. It is all she's dared to think of, with her whole life turned into a long parade of 'somehows,' and nearly painful to imagine any new possibilities, or the chance to hope for more.

If the Lord Consul had actually _meant_ all that he'd said - if Larsa speaks true, and Vayne Solidor honestly wishes for any real, lasting good for Dalmasca…

"I want to believe you. I do."

Larsa's wearing gloves now, fine and white and soft, yet thin enough that she can feel the warmth of his hand when it closes around hers. The blue in his doublet picks up in his eyes, which remain the same shade as the sea, like looking down through the clouds to the ever-shifting waves. He would make a fine merchant, Penelo thinks. If Larsa can make her believe in this, make her _want_ to believe, he could sell anything. It's a heady draught, so much earnestness from a boy with the power to change the way things are, who is good-hearted _because_ he has that power rather than in spite of it.

"I am grateful, then, for the opportunity to prove myself."

He does not let go of her hand. Penelo does not look away.

"Lord Larsa." A soldier appears, and bows, and she can feel the slight shift in the ship, even as Larsa stands, and turns - they're slowing down, the engines cutting speed.

"Yes? Is there a problem?"

"No, milord. We've reached the fleet of ships sent back from the city during the… troubles in Rabanastre," maybe the soldier's eyes flick to Penelo, just for a moment, before he continues, "we are being hailed by the _Tyche_."

If she were not looking at Larsa in that instant, Penelo would miss it, and if she were not already so sensitive to the barest hint of trouble, she might miss it anyway - the slight frown in his eyes, the way his expression fixes in place, carefully blank before he can reveal any more.

"Very well. Send our greetings. We will prepare to dock with them at once."

"Yes, milord. Right away."

The soldier leaves. The Judge Magister is still with them, but it is clear Larsa does not bother to hide his true feelings from someone who is ever present. He lets out a soft sigh, staring for a moment at the ceiling.

"I suppose it is a bit late to ask you to hijack the ship."

Intended as a joke, but his tone is dull, and Penelo gets to her feet because it's always better to be ready to move, even if she doesn't know what's happening, even if there's nowhere to go. "Are we… is there going to be trouble?"

"Many of the Archadians in Dalmasca thought it best to take to the skies rather than move to assist my Lord Brother in the city," Larsa shakes his head, "though I am sure he would say I am being unfair. Of course they are worried over all that has happened, and uncertain of what their next move ought to be. I know the _Tyche_, these are important and well-connected men. As my brother is not here, I must act as representative of House Solidor, and do my best to reassure them all is well."

Complicated, perhaps, but not all that dangerous, though Larsa still stares at her, his expression solemn. "I fear there is nothing left but to face it bravely. We are likely to be bored to death."

It surprises a laugh out of her, and then he smiles, turning to the Judge Magister. "Gabranth, you have my permission to save yourself. My brother will surely understand."

Maybe, just maybe, the tiniest sigh from the depths of the helm, as if Larsa has actually reached something human behind all that steel.

He offers her his arm as the _Balius_ shudders slightly, connecting to the other ship. Penelo reaches for his sleeve, keeping her hold as light as she can. Feeling like a child putting on airs, like none of this is quite real because it isn't, because she isn't whatever Larsa thinks she is, and there are soldiers all around her, reminding her of what will happen should she slip, should anything go wrong.

It ought to mean nothing, that small bit of contact between them as they make their way toward the door. It ought not to feel as if she is protected, that she is in any way safe. Larsa can make all the vows he wants - and he can break them just as easily, the moment she becomes inconvenient. Except that he won't, Penelo is strangely sure of it, which means that she is the one who's lied.

Larsa cannot prove himself to her, if she already trusts him to lead the way.

* * *

Author's Notes -

1. Game dialogue in this section too.


	28. the law of probability 4

"It was his first day. One _day_, and this is what we have to show for it? House Solidor's damn well stirred up the Malboro's nest this time."

The raised voice carries over lower murmurs of conversation as they reach the door of the Tyche's meeting hall. The trading ship is larger than the _Balius_, richly appointed if not crafted with quite so much care, built for show rather than speed. Penelo's new shoes tap lightly against the well-polished floor, not quite loud enough to announce their presence.

"You know they had this planned out, just waiting on his arrival. If you weren't ready for it, you've only got yourself to blame."

"I'd thought the Judges would have handled it all by now. Or is that asking too much?"

"The hell did he say in that speech of his anyway?"

"The speech didn't matter."

"I heard it mattered."

"Maybe they thought he was going to make pants mandatory?"

The first voice again, in annoyed disgust. "You think this is funny, but I'm not the only one in here losing money by the hour."

Penelo's all too familiar with this sort of grumbling, the muttered annoyance and indigence of merchants not getting what they want when they want it. Watching poor weather make merry with their imports, or a turn of fashion wreaking havoc on their exports, or any number of other ways the world can suddenly snatch gil from the coffers. Funny that she feels more comfortable among so many ill-tempered men than alone with Larsa. At least this is a world she understands, even if it's all a bit more well-upholstered and she assumes it's Archadian whisky they're drowning their sorrows in instead of Balfonheim rum.

Whatever reservations or misgivings Larsa may have felt on his own ship, there is no sign of them now. He smiles with a self-assured confidence as he steps inside, no hesitation at all in addressing the room.

"Good afternoon, gentlemen. I hope I am not interrupting."

"Certainly not, Lord Larsa."

The men are all quickly to their feet, or standing straight from where they'd been slouching, giving courteous little bows. A wall of silk waistcoats and golden watch chains and gleaming adornments, all vaguely indistinguishable from one another. Old and rich, well-spoken and likely to mean none of it.

One of them takes a step forward, perhaps appointing himself spokesman for the rest of the group. He seems a good choice for the task, tall and thin with short, dark hair gone only a little salt-and-pepper near his temples. It does not age him, only adding a sense of cool confidence born of long experience. He has a scar framing the right side of his face, from near his eyebrow all the way down to the corner of his mouth. Penelo wonders where he received it, that he hadn't had it quickly healed away. Or that he hadn't wanted to.

"Baron Tibsen, of the eastern highlands. It's an honor that you have accepted our humble invitation. We are glad to hear this disturbance had no echoes in Bhujerba."

A snort from the man Penelo had heard at the start, the loudest of them, though momentarily muffled by a mouthful of whisky. It is likely he does not console himself with his first glass, or his second, and his face is an odd shade of purple that clashes with his red jacket. He swallows, glancing down into the empty glass as if it has somehow failed him. "Ondore knows how to keep his ships in a row. Whatever port they might hail from."

Gossip of the oldest sort, well entrenched that the Marquis has business prospects in every corner of Ivalice - and Rozarrian coin spends as well as the rest.

Penelo sees more than a few of the men gazing behind her, does not have to turn to know the Judge Magister is taking up a position near the door. A bit comforting to know that even these great businessmen of Archades are unnerved by his presence.

"We have been exchanging stories of Rabanastre, of course," the Baron says, "Information has been… rather sparse, yet. The rumors we have heard, the Lord Consul…"

"The aerodrome's been closed ever since he entered the city!" The red-faced man steps in, and Penelo thinks he's appointed himself the angry one, and that the others are likely quite happy to let him embarrass himself on their behalf, "I've got cargo that needs shipping out. I was up half the night - it's not going to keep forever, and I was _promised_-"

"Fortunately," Larsa says, "as my brother is unharmed, I am certain he will make the swift return to normalcy his first concern."

He smiles, the words smooth and even-tempered. Nothing at all to suggest any kind of annoyance, that these men so obviously care more for money than the Lord Consul's safety.

"Of course we are all most grateful that His Lordship has come through such a terrible trial unscathed," Baron Tibsen swiftly steps in. Penelo has to hide a smile at how he tries to recover, at how there's no subtle way to pretend he's doing otherwise.

Maybe she doesn't manage to keep her amusement fully hidden, or maybe the drunken man is addled just enough to think she's worth noticing.

"So is that her, then? This princess of theirs back from the dead?"

All eyes on her, as Penelo tries to make sense of what she realizes is an awkward and unfunny joke, suddenly feeling much less comfortable. Ashelia of Dalmasca, that's who the man's asking about, and of course she'd heard the possibility, just who was leading that charge on the fete. Of course there'd been whispers on the streets before the bangaa had grabbed her. Rumors even before then, two years of speculation. Had the princess been there, when Penelo had rushed down looking for Vaan? It's all a blur now, the sky pirate and all the Archadian soldiers, it had all happened so fast…

"The lady Penelo is my guest," Larsa says, and it's only when he puts his hand on hers that she realizes how hard she's holding his arm, "and she has been so kind as to agree to accompany me to Rabanastre."

Lady. The lady Penelo. Oh, it's getting worse by the minute. If she doesn't figure out a way to get off this ship, she'll be a Duchess before they land.

"Indeed." A murmur passes among the small assembly, a ripple just beneath the surface, and Penelo doesn't understand it but she knows it's about her and it isn't kind. The man with the scar studies her, his polite half-smile such a fiction it seems hardly worth the bother. "Of course, House Solidor has always been one to find opportunity in adversity."

So they think she's not just nobility, but with a high enough title to have taken shelter in Bhujerba during the war. It's clear they're wondering just whose daughter she is, what business House Solidor might have with expatriate Dalmascans on the sky island. Penelo wonders if any of them were put out, when Migelo had been chosen to host the fete rather than one of their own, and how many more Archadians might be preparing to follow the Lord Consul into town, should Rabanastre's prospects improve.

"If only we all had such good fortune." A new voice in the fray, somewhere from the back of the group, "The _Ifrit_ nearly took out two of my ships on its way into town, without so much as a look in our direction. If the Lord Consul should need a steady defense, those ships will be passing right through our airspace. We've got no chance of trading around that. Gods help us if they set up a blockade."

"The trade routes cannot simply be shifted?" Larsa says.

The drunken man snorts, pouring himself another drink. "Simply shift them further and you'll be tossing ships into what's left of Nabradia. The Jagd that direction… border to border, it's a nightmare. New sinkholes open up every time we manage to chart around the last set."

The conversation opens up, everyone with an opinion on how their ships' routes have been the most ill served in the past half-year, so Penelo is the only one to catch a hint of movement, a blur of color from the corner of her eye.

An inner door stands open, leading further into the ship. As she watches, a hand pops into view, small fingers curled around the edge of the frame, followed by a cloud of dark ringlets and a pair of bright, curious eyes. The girl is young, perhaps even younger than Filo, but dressed like an Archadian noble, with lace and ruffles and sobriety to befit any grown woman. It all comes a bit undone, though, when she shifts and Penelo sees bare toes peeking out beneath the edge of her skirts. A mischievous grin, and she's gone again.

"Of course," the Baron says, taking control of the conversation once more, "we are aware the Lord Consul has invested considerable sums in the hopes of developing technologies to counteract the Jagd."

Penelo feels Larsa tense up, just a little, though his expression never changes. Penelo thinks that if the drunken man speaks for their anger, this man is the one to be conciliatory, to politely find the compromise. Except it is a politeness no deeper than the surface of things, empty of warmth or truth and only considerate to his own ends. Clearly, Larsa is familiar with such men, and he meets him in kind, a smile that is equally conciliatory and gives nothing away.

"The Draklor Laboratories have made many exceptional advances in airship technology as of late, and my lord brother has every confidence they will continue to do so."

"I have heard that in the realm of Manufacted Nethicite, he has every reason to be confident."

Penelo is certain then, this is the reason Larsa did not want to be in this room. It's true what he's said of Nethicite, that it is rare and highly valuable and these men want far more than reassurance - they want information, and this meeting will be nothing but thinly veiled attempts to learn what he knows, to determine Vayne Solidor's ultimate course of action. Larsa's eyes flick to hers, for the briefest instant, and there is that hint of a smile again, a real smile. The secret joke between the two of them, that he has in his pocket the very treasure they so wish for. Easily within their reach, and none of them will ever know it.

"Ah, where are my manners? Forgive me," the Baron surprises Penelo then, by remembering she exists, "no lady should have to endure such conversation among men."

He gestures to the open door. "Isbelyn! Come here, child."

The girl reappears, hands quickly smoothing down the front of her dress, walking towards them with as much delicacy as it is the desire to hide her bare feet. Not that the men take more than a passing notice of her, and she curtsies deeply to Larsa, eyes sparkling with a mixture of awe and delight.

"Milord Solidor. Milady. It is an honor."

"This girl is my niece, and charge," Baron Tibsen says, with the same air as someone describing a mildly interesting piece of furniture, "Isbelyn, do show the lady Penelo to your sister's rooms, that she may be entertained in a more befitting manner."

Penelo is usually entertained by listening to Vaan and Kytes attempt to belch the chorus of the Dalmascan national anthem - pride of the country and all - but she's a lady now, which apparently means she's deserving of better. It also means there's no way to protest or argue or do much of anything as the girl quickly takes her by the arm, pulling her away.

Larsa seems disappointed to see her go, though it's probably more about having to stay behind, and Penelo feels more than a little guilty for leaving him to such a fate. Still, she's certain he had stepped on board knowing exactly where this would all lead, and just as certain that, should things prove unpleasant, he can simply have the Judge Magister punch them all until the meeting is adjourned.

At the door she takes a last glance back, but the men have all shifted position and Larsa has completely vanished into the crowd. The girl tugs on Penelo's hand with a surprising ferocity for her size, and in what seems to be a distressingly common theme for the day, she can only follow along and wonder what in the world will happen next.


	29. the law of probability 5

"Look at your shoulders! Oh, you're so tan. I wish I were that tan. I look like a corpse."

The girl has not taken her eyes off Penelo, even to look where she's going. At any moment she seems ready to go head over heels, all attention on her new guest and none on where she puts her feet.

"You're wearing one of those strange dresses, without any buttons. How do you wear such a pretty thing? Are you really from Rabanastre? You are, aren't you?"

She speaks in a stage whisper, though there isn't any reason for it, the halls here quite empty save for the two of them. Penelo wonders where they are going, though so far the girl has not paused long enough for her to draw a breath, let alone ask a question of her own.

"Do you know many boys there? We saw a group of them at a town near the border, playing a game. They were all quite worth looking at, and they do not seem to like clothes very much. Do they dress like that in the city, too? I'm sure you must know some very handsome boys."

The girl stops short, and sweeps up both of Penelo's hands, clasping them fast. "Oh, this is all so exciting! I have not had the chance to speak with a real Dalmascan! You must tell us everything, all at once!"

"Isbi!" A voice from behind a nearby door, slightly muffled, and Penelo sees the girl grimace ever so slightly. "Isbelyn Cydele, I know you're out there, running around half-dressed and-"

The door opens, and an older girl appears, brandishing a pair of stockings in one hand, shoes in the other and an annoyed look that quickly turns to shock. Penelo decides upon a smile that is equal parts shyness and apology. Isbelyn rocks back on her heels, smugness from tip to toe.

"Our uncle has asked us to entertain a visitor." A childish flourish of one hand, and perhaps half a giggle, so much gossip in so small a girl she can hardly contain it all, "Sister, may I present the Lady Penelo of Rabanastre, traveling from Bhujerba as the honored guest of Lord Larsa Solidor."

The older girl has not stopped gaping. Penelo tries not to wince. "It's not as exciting as it sounds."

The other half of Isbeyn's giggle rings out in the silence. "It sounds very exciting."

"Isbi!"

Scandal finally frees the older girl from her surprise, and she quickly attempts to corral her little sister. It works about as well as Penelo's attempts to forestall a food fight after one too many days of rewarmed bread and tomatoes. There is a good deal of whining, a dignified attempt at admonition and finally a bit of simple wrangling, stockings and shoes shoved in the younger girl's arms and the girl herself shoved in what Penelo assumes is a dressing room, the door slamming shut behind her.

"Isbelyn, ladies do not slam doors!" The older girl says, a poised hand against her head, as if warding off the world's most graceful headache, her next words just loud enough for Penelo to hear, "no matter how satisfying it might be."

She glances over, and Penelo grins in sympathy, and the girl smiles back and with that, a great deal of awkwardness rushes out of the room all at once.

"I apologize for my sister's regrettable lack of manners. It has been rather an exciting time for us, and she is still quite young." A curtsey, and Penelo mirrors the movement, "My name is Rhiale. Rhiale Kyndall M-" A small frown flickers across her face, just for a moment. "No, it is Tibsen now. At least for a little while longer."

Rhiale is not much older than Penelo, but in one of those Archadian dresses with all the dignity that comes with them, muted jewel tones and long, full skirts and a noble, graceful maturity. The bodice of her dress is all in green velvet, with thin gold thread stitched in a diamond pattern all along the front, and she's wearing a rather ornate headpiece, a shining cage for her long, dark braids. A bit of nervousness creeps back in, there's no helping it. Penelo may not be wearing the clothes she crawled from the mines in, but this Archadian is not a girl with calluses under her gloves or freckles on her shoulders from hours of hauling cargo in the sun, either.

"I cannot offer much, but all my hospitality is yours," Rhiale says, gesturing toward the larger room, with the slightest waver in her voice that makes Penelo think she might not be the only one uncertain of what to do next, hiding any nervousness behind manners as impervious as stone.

The _Tyche's_ rooms are, perhaps, what Larsa meant when he apologized for his bachelor's quarters - a full suite here, with heavy drapes and the glimpse of a claw-footed tub in the bath and marble-topped tables set with elaborate dried bouquets. Everything required for when being in an airship is not quite impressive enough. The sitting room opens on a full view of the sky, floor to ceiling, with the _Balius_ visible, flying just behind the larger ship. Penelo watches it gleam for a moment in the sun, the thin, high clouds swirling past the stern. It's going to hurt, to let go of all this. Only one day of being airborne and she'd do almost anything not to give it up.

"My sister spoke truly, then? You are from Rabanastre?"

"Yes," Penelo can't help herself, "though from the part that wears clothes."

Rhiale shakes her head with an embarrassed smile. "I beg you, please do not mark anything by Isbi's idle chatter. I promise she is just as inappropriate to family as she is to strangers."

"Do you both… live here?" Penelo says, looking around the room. It doesn't seem to have much in the way of personal touches, but perhaps that is not the way they do things in Archadia.

"Oh, no. My sister and I were in Rabanastre for the Lord Consul's arrival. I was to have my debut once my uncle had… made measure of the men in attendance," Rihale looks at her hands for a moment, "my uncle is the Baron Tibsen. We are greatly indebted that he has agreed to sponsor me."

The words come out as if she's repeating them, less gratitude than rote recital, though if the man with the scar is her uncle Penelo can see why even his kindness might not seem a comfort.

Before Penelo can think to ask any more questions there is a flurry of movement and the rustle of skirts and Isbelyn is with them again, dropped into the seat next to Penelo with more exuberance than grace. There are stockings on her feet now, but her shoes are still in her hands and her sister looks at her pointedly.

"I'm putting them on." Isbelyn mutters, but brightens again as she looks up, "oh, please tell me you haven't said anything interesting."

"Who would dare?" Rhiale says dryly, though there there is a look that passes between the sisters, annoyed and amused and affectionate, before the younger girl goes back to peppering Penelo with endless questions.

"Did you go to the fete? We didn't even get to land in the city. Our uncle bid us wait - I thought we should have gone anyway - and then we heard there'd been an attack. We saw the Ifrit over the palace. I heard the Lord Consul was nearly killed by rebels! Were you there? Did you see it?"

The first real opportunity she's had, to set this all to rights. Yes, of course she had seen the attack, but not from anywhere near the palace. How is she supposed to say that she's likely closer to knowing rebels than the men they're rebelling against? That all she's done is put on a fancy dress and refuse to tell the whole truth when she ought to. Once again, her silence proves a wicked ally, whatever's on her face enough to be mistaken for discomfort, the strain of remembering what she'd only seen at a distance.

"Isbelyn, you shouldn't bring up such terrible things. No one wants to talk about them."

"_I _want to talk about them," the girl says, crossing her arms with a huff, leaning back heavily as her sister continues to glare. Penelo can see Rhiale fight to keep from rolling her eyes, determinedly searching for a more polite topic, or at least one with fewer attempted murders.

"So, how long have you and Lord Larsa been acquainted?"

At least this she can explain. Penelo is not so naive to think the question mere politeness, and no doubt Archades is even worse than Rabanastre about such matters of decorum, lords and ladies walking about unchaperoned.

"No more than a few hours, truly. You see, I was kidnapped…"

"_Kidnapped_! How marvelous!"

"_Isbi_!"

"It can't be my fault if _she's_ the one who was kidnapped!" Isbelyn wails defiantly, pointing at Penelo, who can only shrug. Rhiale simply gives up then, her pretty face pressed into her pretty gloves and if she's where Penelo's been - picking bits of tomato out of Vaan's hair as any number of vaguely known children wreak merry havoc through their kitchen - then she's likely stifling a scream.

"Oh, you _have_ to tell us, now," the younger girl says, pressing the advantage, "you must, you absolutely must."

So Penelo does, as much to try and get everything in the proper order, to convince herself that yes, it's actually still happening. She excises bits and pieces from her life in Rabanastre, and tries not to overdramatize the rest, but Isbelyn is on the edge of her seat before she's even reached the mines, and mentioning sky pirates causes the girl to gasp in delight, interrupting with what seems to be every story she's ever heard of adventures in the clouds. Penelo is just speaking of her time with Larsa in the city, when she is interrupted by the sudden appearance of a rather old moogle, fluttering carefully through the air with a tea tray. Rhiale is on her feet instantly, crossing the distance between them.

"Sofi, please, do not put yourself out on our account," she says gently, taking the tray, "I am perfectly capable of making tea."

The moogle tuts gently, as if the idea is utterly absurd, and pauses to give Penelo a genteel bow. Making sure they have all that they might need, she flutters away to a corner, settling herself down in a cozy chair near the window.

"Sofi has been our nursemaid all our lives, my sister and I," Rhiale says, lifting the lid to check how far the tea has steeped, "She is family, especially now. I rather hope… oh, but that isn't important. You were speaking of Bhujerba."

"If you did not stop me, I think I would go on forever," Penelo smiles, "have you been there?"

"Only recently, with our Uncle."

"He duels, you know? Uncle does." Isbelyn says from around a mouthful of icing, a second small cake in her other hand before she's even finished the first. Rhiale pulls the rest of them quickly out of her reach. "It's how he got that scar. He's not supposed to - it's a law, but they all do it anyway. We shouldn't talk about it, of course," the girl grins, obviously only interested in what she's not supposed to talk about, believing that lowering her voice theatrically is the same as being secretive. "I heard he put his sword right through a man once, and couldn't get it out again. It got stuck! Do you think that could really happen?"

"Isbi! Ladies do not - _no one_ speaks of such things. Uncle has done us a great honor and kindness, and we owe him our utmost respect."

"_He's_ the one who made such a big deal of it, didn't he? I don't know why he had to bring you here to marry anyway," the younger girl says, "there were plenty of eligible bachelors back home, " an evil smirk in Penelo's direction, deliberately pressing her luck, "My sister doesn't want to marry a nobleman, you know. She wants to be ravished by sky pirates."

"You insufferable little wretch!" Rhiale yelps, making a very undignified lunge at her sister, who laughs, jumping off the couch and out of reach. Unfortunately, doing so also upends her tea, splashing quite impressively across the front of her dress. Isbelyn freezes, looking down at the mess she's caused, trying to think of a way to get out of it, and realizing she's doomed all in the same moment.

"Oh… drat."

Penelo had thought the moogle asleep in the sun, but all at once Sofi is there, fluttering and scolding, herding Isbelyn into another room to change. Rhiale lets out a deep sigh, raising a hand to her carefully bound-up hair only to stop at the last moment, and Penelo sees her jaw clench in frustration. As if all of this is not as familiar to her as it should be.

"Ah, please… you don't have to…" the girl protests, as Penelo kneels down, reaching for the teacup. Thankfully unbroken, and the cloth beneath the tray takes care of the worst of the mess, the carpet too dark to show a stain.

"Already done," she says, and though she doubts it was the proper thing for a lady to do Rhiale doesn't seem to think the less of her for it. If anything, the girl seems to relax a bit, and her expression shifts, less serene but more warm and honest. It must be very tiring, having to remember how to act and what to do and what not to do. How to fold up every emotion into only what is pretty, or at least easy to ignore.

"Thank you. I must apologize once more for my terribly silly sister," Rhiale says, rubbing gently at one temple with her fingertip, "she does not understand the… delicacy of our current situation."

"I think I know how she feels," Penelo says, "this is hardly where I expected to find myself today."

"Isbi does not have half your excuse. The past two years have spoiled her, she's grown too well accustomed to not being out in society. I have neglected my responsibilities, and find myself with a ill-mannered yensa in place of a sister."

"I thought…" Penelo catches herself, before she can ask why a noble girl wouldn't have tutors for that, though what she blurts out is hardly more polite. "You are to marry, she said. In Dalmasca?"

Rhiale pales, and looks away.

"I'm sorry." Penelo says, "I didn't mean-"

"Oh, there's no need for apologies," The girl turns back, and smiles, but it's that gracious smile again, all her fears once again hidden away. "Yes, I am to be married. My uncle could have begun negotiations at the fete, even, if he approved of the match. Unfortunately, circumstances have led to this… unfortunate delay. I do not know when…" Rhiale's voice trembles, and she swallows hard, and Penelo thinks she is holding onto her smile through pure force of will. "I imagine my uncle wished for me to be cleverer than I am, and find out more about you. How you are connected to Lord Larsa, and what is happening in Rabanastre, so that he might seek a better position with the Lord Consul."

"I don't know what's happening in the city, or if anyone does," Penelo says, "… but I'm not sure that you'll be safe there."

Rhiale laughs, but it's a brittle, colorless sound. "I imagine I will seem quite brave then, to return so quickly. Do Dalmascan men prefer their wives to be brave? If nothing else, I do suppose there will be less competition now than later."

She is completely terrified. Penelo wonders how it took her so long to see it - but then, that's what the dress is for, and the color on her cheeks and the ornaments in her hair. A perfect Archadian lady with perfect Archadian manners, to hide the truth that she is a frightened girl trying to be brave for her sister's sake, preparing to be married to a stranger who only matters as far as he can improve her uncle's prospects.

Penelo reaches out then, like she'd do for anyone back home, to give Rhiale's hand a comforting squeeze. The girl looks up at her, surprise quickly shifting to gratitude and then Isbelyn charges back into the room, wearing a different gown she might well ruin in some even more spectacular way, and they go back to pretending that nothing at all is the matter


	30. the law of probability 6

Isbelyn switches topics faster in a minute than most can manage in an hour, so it doesn't take long for the matter of dancing to come up. Of course it is as popular in Archadia as in Dalmasca, though like everything else, far more strict and structured there.

"You dance? Rhiale, you can play for us, and Penelo will show us the steps they have in Rabanastre."

The room has a small piano, so ornately painted that it seemed to be just another decoration, but it manages a merry tune and Rhiale is happy to acquiesce to anything that will keep her sister occupied and out of trouble. Penelo still takes the extra time to move the most fragile-looking furniture well out of the way.

Time passes quite happily after that, the music bright and cheerful and Penelo never as certain of the world as when she's dancing - wherever she is, it's as good as home. Isbelyn is, unsurprisingly, an eager and exuberant student. Penelo leads her through a few of the simper steps of old Dalmascan standards, the loose and graceful movements a little at odds with the formal music - she misses the drums, misses bells and firelight, this the kind of dance that ought to be done on bare sand beneath a wide-open sky.

She's focused on her steps, on making sure Isbelyn can follow, so it takes a moment to notice when the song ends. Rhiale is watching her, with a small smile on her face. Penelo hopes it is some comfort for her, that her new life in a strange land might not be so bad, if there is still dancing.

Eventually, they move back into the Archadian steps, and though a pair of dancers can hardly get away with it they still _allemande_ and _galliarde_ up and down the room, Isbelyn preferring to leap her way into the turns - and anywhere else she can get away with it - while Penelo tries a few fancier flourishes and spins, though most get slowed down to a crawl anyway when Isbelyn tries to copy her.

It isn't slow going with the Rozarrian _tarantella_, or what she can manage of it between her bare feet and the tightly-bound dress. The younger girl gives up early, but soon Rhiale is playing as fast as she can as Penelo dances. The two of them chasing each other, footsteps and staccato notes until they are both left catching their breath as Isbelyn claps and cheers.

"You're _amazing_! Oh, I wish you'd been there to teach me. The last instructor we had nearly knocked me into a hedge," Isbelyn says, with all the scorn she can muster, "and he kept _stepping_ on my _toes._"

"Very well done," Rhiale agrees, "I think there will be many girls quite cross with you, Penelo, when Lord Larsa sees no need to dance with them anymore."

A shame she's not standing in front of a mirror, to see that thought hit her. Dancing at court. In Archades.

It certainly gives more weight to the notion that none of this is happening, that Penelo's been hit with sunstroke and even now is wandering some bit of the Estersand, talking to passing lizards about sky pirates and airships and how she'll dance all night with the Emperor's son, right before they make her Queen of the Universe.

"I think…" Searching for anything sensible to say, Penelo rubs a thumb along the edge of her gown, surprised at how loose the fabric hangs, "well, I will certainly need to find another dress for that day. I fear I may have danced this one out."

Her wrap is coming undone in a dozen places, meant for more sedate affairs and not what she'd been up to, certainly not at six-eighths time. It isn't a quick fix either, Penelo can all but hear her mother chiding that she'll look a utter wreck if she doesn't unwind it all and start entirely from scratch.

"Oh, Rhia - you can have Penelo show you how to wear it! You did want to know, right?" Isbelyn nearly bounces with excitement. "We'll just put you up in one of ours. My sister has plenty to spare."

"I don't…" Rhiale says, "I mean… if it would not be too much trouble."

What she really means is _help me_, and so soon Penelo is up to her elbows in dresses, silks and satins of all colors. Drawing out dress after dress, with matching gloves and shoes and she acquiesces to the corset but refuses anything that requires a bustle no matter how Isbelyn huffs at her.

"I'm glad that we are about the same size," Rhiale says, lacing up the ties, "this is just for a bit of support, tell me if it hurts and I'll loosen it. Last season the girls were snapping themselves in half, but thankfully now the fashion is a bit less severe."

"I've never worn one before." Penelo says, and looks down, unsurprised to find she does not magically fill out the top the way Rhiale did, "I don't suppose you have a curve or two I could borrow?"

"That's what the bustle is for," Isbelyn says unhelpfully.

"You whine whenever you think you might have to wear one, Isbi, so stop trying to pawn them off on everyone else." Rhiale scolds, finishing with the ties and stepping back to give her handiwork a look.

"So, did you find a dress to your liking?"

"They're all very pretty." Penelo says helplessly, "but I'm not sure… I mean…"

"The gold one," Isbelyn says, making the decision for her, and she sounds so certain Penelo thinks she might as well agree.

"With the blue? But the green dress is quite lovely, too." Rhiale tips her head to the side, trying to imagine Penelo into it.

"_That_ shade of blue is Lord Larsa's favorite color." Isbelyn says.

"Every shade of blue is Lord Larsa's favorite color." Rhiale rolls her eyes, "and every girl in Archades knows how best to trap his heart."

"He likes chocobos," Penelo says, though that is not likely to trap any hearts.

"Well then, Isbi's right. It will have to be the gold."

The dress is sleeveless, the bodice in smooth, golden satin to a tapered waist, simple but elegant. The long skirt is a light blue, stitched with lacy patterns of gold embroidery. It looks very fancy, but Penelo is surprised at how easily she can move, turning this way and that in the wide mirror as if she's Isbelyn's age. Rhiale sits her down, and it isn't long before her hair is braided up tight, so carefully bound she's afraid to even touch it. It's difficult to look away from her reflection, still herself and yet now transformed, looking refined, more elegant than she'd ever imagined she could.

"Oh, no. I couldn't…" Penelo says, as Rhiale drops a necklace into place at her throat. An aquamarine, square-cut and brilliant, the same color blue as her skirts.

"I would be a poor hostess indeed, to leave you half-finished. Of course you must borrow it." Rhiale shuffles through a small box on the table, "I have earrings to match. We could pierce your ears, if you like?"

"You should," Isbelyn says, "you really should. It would look lovely. Don't worry, Rhia did mine for me. It hardly hurts at all."

It isn't a matter of liking, or looking lovely, as much as being distracted, overwhelmed by the unexpected generosity. Of knowing she needs to tell the truth and _now_… except Rhiale wouldn't want her to touch anything more if she knew where Penelo really came from. All of this has to stop before it can get any worse and yet - and yet she cannot bring herself to speak, and in a few moments more she's wearing earrings to match the necklace. Only the faintest bit of pain when she brings her fingers up to her ears, and soon even that fades away.

"I believe it's your turn?" Penelo offers, when it seems there's nothing more to be done. Rhiale looks suddenly much less confident, twisting a ring on her finger as if wishing it were a teleport stone.

"You have to, Rhia." Isbelyn says, "after you made such a mangle of the last one Uncle said he wouldn't buy you another."

"He bought you those?" Penelo says, staring once more at the racks and racks of gowns, "all of them?"

"It is a worthy investment," Rhiale says, no emotion in the words but she does not look up when she speaks. "Uncle is very kind."

Isbelyn helps her sister out of her dress, and then out of the layers of petticoats beneath, into the simple underlayer Penelo's set out for her. Rhiale's eyes are wide, rubbing at her bare shoulders shyly.

"My goodness, so little. It feels like I'm not wearing anything at all."

"You weren't, the last time you tried to put it on," Isbelyn says, giggling.

"Enough out of you," Rhiale says, shooing her sister to the nearby divan, and Penelo can't help but smile as she surveys the long yards of fabric, as if they are pieces of some great puzzle box or a scroll of violently cryptic spellcraft, just waiting for the chance to singe her fingertips.

"It's not as bad as all that, I promise," Penelo says, and begins the process of wrapping her into her gown. Rhiale is attentive, following every instruction slowly and carefully, and it is only a lack of training that leads to a few lumps, one or two folds that don't quite want to stay in place.

Penelo can't help but wonder about the cloth merchants in Migelo's circles, and the potential profits of incorporating Archadian motifs into Dalmascan dresses, if there are to be more moments like these to be had. Maybe even a chance for her to give more demonstrations, should the fashion become truly popular. Judging by the girl's smile, it seems a possibility.

"My goodness," Rhiale says, turning to look at her handiwork in the mirror, "look at me. I suppose all is not lost, after all."

"We can try it again, if you like," Penelo says, and then she is holding on to one end of the fabric as Rhiale slowly spins herself free. Isbelyn has propped herself up against the armrest of the couch, yawning once and again, too much dancing and too many cakes finally catching up with her.

"If you cannot find a husband in Rabanastre, Rhia," she murmurs, "maybe you can marry the Lord Consul instead."

"… or I might elope with the west wind, if I wished to be sensible," she says, frowning in concentration as she tries to remember how much fabric the third fold catches up.

"The Lord Consul isn't married?" Penelo says, surprised.

"No," Rhiale says, and she's lost her place again, unfolding the fabric to start once more. "Of course, there has always been speculation over this alliance or that. Whatever it is he's holding out for, but it has been a long time now, and House Solidor…"

Rhiale trails off, just like the soldiers at the gates and every other Archadian who knows anything about Vayne Solidor. Larsa is the only one Penelo's met yet who doesn't get that strange, cautious look when he mentions his House. The only one to speak of his brother as if there isn't some hidden price to be paid.

"It will be quite an… interesting life, I imagine, for the girl that House claims for their own," Rhiale says. "Of course, House Marcalis has never merited any special attention of the throne. This is the first that I have been on the same ship as any of the Imperial family."

"House Marcalis?" Penelo's curious, that's not the name the girl said before. With no idea what might cause offense, she tries to take it slow, "… and that is… your House?"

"Yes… and no." Rhiale says, "we are here under my Uncle's name and favor, Isbi and I. A sponsorship in House Tibsen, but that is not permanent," Rhiale loses her hold on the fabric again, this time only into the second fold, and she sighs heavily. "My uncle seeks offers for my hand - or more accurately, the highest bid for entry to our House. When I am wed, it will be under the Marcalis name. Our own name once more, and forever on. An incentive, I suppose, to push things forward as quickly as we can."

An entire world in that explanation that Penelo cannot begin to measure. Even if she were a Dalmascan of title, the codes and laws of Archadia are not meant for outsiders to understand. Maybe comparable to Migelo's trickiest trading with his most elusive desert clients, complicated agreements and implicit obligations, and all of that magnified by wealth and title and history. Penelo wonders what would happen to Rhiale's name, if she did not marry, or not well enough to suit her uncle's ambitions.

"House Marcalis can trace our lineage nearly as far back as the Galtean Alliance, before the founding of the Empire. Our family's estate is a jewel in the northern crown of Archadia," Rhiale smiles, both proud and amused, "which means they are very beautiful for being so small - oh _curse it_!" she mutters, as once again the folds melt away in her hands. "I really ought to just have you teach Sofi, and we might be done with this before nightfall."

"I promise it gets easier," Penelo says, taking the fabric from her, and Rhiale lets it go, enough practice for one day, "it took me a long time to learn. I would have studied much harder, if I'd known I would have to try and teach it."

"Am I expected to wear this every day?"

"No, not usually. It depends on where you are, inside the city or out, and for what occasion." Penelo says, tucking and wrapping the girl into place, only slightly hindered by her own gown. "I promise you, there's nothing at all wrong with the dresses you have brought."

"Uncle thought as much. He said I would be very… novel, even as I am," Rhiale says, turning to examine Penelo's handiwork in the mirror, hands lightly smoothing over the soft fabric. "Look at that. It's perfect. I think I hate you a little now."

Penelo laughs. They're both looking at her reflection - and the pronounced difference between the cold reserve of her still-caged hair and the gentler folds of the dress.

It takes a little work to get the ornament free from her hair without taking her whole head with it - Penelo is shocked by how much the headpiece weighs, though the other girl had never seemed to notice it. Once Rhiale's hair is loose, it is easy enough to unplait her braids into a less severe style. The girl's hair is very long, nearly to her waist, a rich, deep brown that shimmers in the light. If there were a dozen such girls looking for husbands in Dalmasca, Penelo still thinks Rhiale would do quite well for herself.

"Oh, your hair's all down," Isbelyn murmurs sleepily, head in her arms on the end of the couch and just barely awake, "You look like mother, Rhia."

"Do I now?" Rhiale says, with a wistful, sad little smile, still looking at her reflection. Penelo only realizes her hands have gone still when the girl looks up at her.

"You would think me very wicked, if I told you I was grateful when we were forced to leave Rabanastre," Rhiale says, softly. "I do not mean that I was glad anyone was hurt, of course, and it is not that I do not wish to marry…"

Except that if it was true, she wouldn't be crying. The tears come suddenly and silently, such a perfectly composed collapse that Penelo cannot imagine it is the first time. That this is often where Rhiale finds herself when she is alone, when her sister is asleep and she does not have to pretend to be strong.

"Forgive me," she whispers around the barest breath of a sob, lips pressed together and eyes squeezed tight. Penelo puts a hand on her shoulder and the girl leans against her and they stay like that for a while, until Rhiale's breathing evens out and she's dabbing at her eyes carefully with her fingertips. Penelo wishes she had Balthier's handkerchief to offer, but that had been in the pocket of her old clothes and she doubts she'll ever see those again.

"There's no one else who can help you?"

Rhiale shakes her head, swallowing hard until her voice is back under control.

"Our lands were always too small to make much money with tenants. Father had his investments, his business partners, and when it seemed the war might… he went out to make arrangements. Mother went with him, and my brother, to our other estate… in Nabudis."

No other word in the world explains itself so completely.

"I should have gone with him, and Isbi too, but I fell ill at the last moment. I tell myself that they would have been happy that we survived. That it wouldn't have been easier…" Rhiale shakes her head. "Listen to me, speaking as if you don't know about war. As if we aren't the ones mucking about in Dalmasca, when we ought to have stayed home. If only everyone had just stayed home."

Penelo isn't sure what she'd been expecting, aware that there was some complication in the other girl's life, but she'd never thought she would understand it quite so well. At least Migelo has never tried to marry her off, or even suggested the notion. She wonders if anyone has ever asked him, or if her father had been made an offer. It happens now and then, arranged marriages long before anyone is even of age. It's strange to think of such a choice as any kind of luxury, but it's true - at least Penelo's life is still her own.

"I am not yet of the age to inherit, and even if I were, we lost so much with Nabudis. We do not have the money to keep up our lands, and my sister will need a debut soon enough, and I will /not/ see her-" Rhiale cuts herself off again, but Penelo can finish the thought well enough. If nothing else, all this will ensure Isbelyn is not set upon the same path someday. "The title I can offer will attract a husband wealthy enough to keep the Marcalis lands as our own. I must marry and marry well, for my House and my sister, and that must satisfy. It will satisfy."

Optimistic, honorable words, in the tone of someone preparing for her execution. Penelo slowly, gently undoes the simple braids she's made in favor of a more complicated style, hoping the gentle work will serve as comfort, distraction or both.

"I hope, whatever happens, that you might come to look upon Dalmasca as your home. It is different from Archadia, but we have our fair share of beauty."

"Tell me?" Rhiale says, wanting very much to be convinced.

"I have seen the sunrise over the desert nearly every day of my life, and it still amazes me. The shades of rose and gold, as the blue-gray of night fades away, until the whole world just… glows. In the right places, you can hear the sands sing in the wind, it's so still. Many of the estates have rooftop terraces, you can look out over the city walls, and see wild chocobos running across the sands." Penelo can imagine exactly what kind of home the girl will end up as mistress of, if this Baron Tibsen is as good as he claims. "If you marry a businessman, you will likely give many parties for his friends and clients. We are fond of such celebrations in Rabanastre, though likely not as formal as what you're used to. I promise you won't lack for company, or entertainment."

"I wouldn't know how to… I mean, you've seen me try to dress myself." Rhiale laughs weakly. "I mean… what if," and her voice goes very small and thin, "what if they don't like me?"

"Well, I've only known you a few hours, and I like you," Penelo says, "although that could be because I'm wearing all your jewelry."

Rhiale turns, looking up at her with a real smile now. "You are very kind, Penelo, and you are right. I should not be so afraid, not if Rabanastre has sent you to welcome me. I hope that we will be even better friends from now on."

Penelo doesn't have the chance to think up a lie, a promise she can't keep even if she wants to, when a knock at the door makes them both jump. Sofi is across the room before they're both even standing, and Penelo tenses up again at the sight of a lone soldier, anonymous in his armor. At least it isn't the Judge Magister. Despite the helm, she's almost certain he's staring at them, baffled by the Archadian and Dalmascan who have suddenly switched wardrobes.

"May we help you, sir?" Rhiale says, and he shakes himself from his surprise.

"Ladies," he bows, and Penelo tries not to flinch when he turns to address her, "Milady Penelo, Lord Larsa has sent me with his apologies, but there are a few unexpected complications he must attend to before he is able to leave for Rabanastre."

He's still not done with the merchants? Or, more likely, the merchants aren't done with him. It's hard to believe she's coming out of this with the better deal, but it certainly seems that way now. Before she can even ask where they are or if they've reached the border of Dalmasca, Penelo feels the ship start to slow.

"It is Lord Larsa's request that we escort you down to the city, where he will rejoin you as soon as he is able."

Isbelyn is still asleep, and Rhiale has little time to do more than clasp Penelo's hands in her own and smile, wishing her luck and a safe journey. and then she's on her own again, before she can even ask the other girl to join her. Or to ask to stay, or think of any other plan that doesn't leave her once more surrounded by Archadian soldiers, with every optimistic, encouraging word she's just said seeming to taunt her now. All Penelo knows is that when they reach the ground she has to escape, as quick and quiet as she can manage while wearing a full-length gown.

* * *

It ought to be easy to disappear, or if not easy than at least with the odds in her favor. Certainly, Penelo knows the city better than any guard possibly could, and should they turn their backs but for a moment it will be enough to sneak away.

Catching sight of Rabanastre through the window of the transport destroys any fleeting remnants of whatever fantasies she's been playing at, and the guard at her side is a perfect reminder of the consequences, should she wish to forget again. Penelo has to get carefully out of the borrowed dress and the borrowed jewels and find some way of sending them quickly back to their proper owner.  
It will be easy enough to write a formal apology to Rhiale and Larsa, explaining what happened and begging their forgiveness for the misunderstanding. As long as all is accounted for, it should go no further than that. Once they realize she's a nobody, it will be easy enough for them to forget they'd ever heard of her. Penelo can go back to the shop, Vaan will find his way home and life will go on as it has been. The next time he has some marvelous idea for freedom or revenge or honor, Penelo will just lock him in the storage closet until he stops coming up with plans.

It's sensible, and a course of action she can actually follow through on the moment they touch down - except that the transport does not stop at the aerodrome. The merchants had said it was closed since the Lord Consul's arrival, and it has only been a day and a half since then, impossible as that might seem. Penelo feels her heart sink and her hopes follow as the transport ship descends right into the palace grounds instead, a landing space cleared away well inside the walls.

There are soldiers everywhere, and Penelo has to stop herself twice from wringing the fine gloves right off her hands, escorted into the shadow of the palace and then into the building itself. She is shown into a fine room, with a window that opens on an inner, terraced courtyard, the very center of the palace grounds. Dalmasca's tapestries grace the walls and there are familiar patterns in the tile floors. Penelo might even know the person responsible for the bowl of fruit that graces a side table but she might as well be back in the sky, for how close it puts her toward getting home.

She paces quietly up and down, heart thumping, trying to map out the palace in her mind, or at least her best guess. Penelo's never actually been inside, never closer than one of the storehouses near to the kitchens, when her father and Migelo had offered their services for the wedding feast. The traditional dishes of Nabradia had been just different enough to send everyone in the city scrambling for the right ingredients in the largest amounts they could find.

Penelo's father had insisted she enjoy herself rather than help, but by the end of the day Penelo had run out of things to see, do or eat, and there'd still been no sign of him. She'd finally found him on the floor of the storehouse, a space that had been tightly packed in the morning practically empty to the roof beams. He'd been flat on his back with Migelo beside him, too exhausted to even think of moving. Penelo had brought them wine, and they'd raised the glasses above their heads in a blind toast, never moving an inch more than they'd had to.

It's one of her favorite memories, but of little help now. Penelo's hands clench into frustrated fists, no closer to a way out and she's suddenly very weary of always having to have a plan. Sick of being dragged about by everyone who thinks they have a right, never knowing what might happen next and she is tired most of all of it always ending here, of being helpless and afraid.  
Penelo steels herself, exhales slowly, and opens the door. The guard outside stands at attention, staring straight ahead, though as she steps out he addresses her.

"Is there a problem, milady?"

"No, no problem. I would like to see a bit more of the palace, is all."

"Of course, milady. If you would like an escort…"

"I'll be fine, thank you."

It can't be that easy, even if she is the guest of Larsa Solidor, but Penelo doesn't let her disbelief show. Nobles never look surprised by being able to do whatever they want. She knows how an Archadian lady is supposed to move, so Penelo makes her way down the hall, stiff-backed and graceful and entirely unhurried, as if this is all exactly as she'd expected it to be.

It's difficult not to crane her neck and stare, to wonder where the throne room might be. Where Princess Ashelia's rooms were, and what other kings and leaders might have once walked the halls she's moving through now. Still, there is a goal for her to reach, and she needs to move quickly, before her luck has a chance to fail. So far, none of soldiers have said anything to her. It will be the guards at the exits who pose the most serious problem, but Penelo can claim some emergency, certainly. Leave all her most gracious apologies for Larsa - and it's surprising, really, how much she truly _will_ miss him. It had been fun to talk with him in Bhujerba, and would be just as much fun to show him her city, as he'd intended. If there were some way… but there's _not_ a way, and every moment she stays here is only a risk to herself, and everyone she knows.

A few more turns and she's found a nearly empty hall. Penelo fights to keep her pace slow and steady. If she's lucky, she's nearly there, a door to an outer courtyard and from there just a few steps to the walls, and then the street. If the guards try to stop her, maybe she'll just run and hope for the best.

"Oh, it's unforgivably reckless. One can only imagine where he acquired the habit." A heavy sigh. "I'm amazed you didn't give them all weapons first, just to make it a proper challenge."

A door opens around the final corner, and she hears the sound of footsteps coming toward her, fast.

"If I shut myself away, they'll think they actually accomplished something. Fear _is_ the weapon, Cid. If it's to be my hesitation or my blood, they're free to paint the walls with it. But I'm not about to-"

Penelo thinks that she knows that voice, in a way that pins her to the spot before she even knows quite why. Before the two men turn the corner, and she sees that the one in the lead is the Lord Consul. Vayne Solidor.

He stops. The other man stops as well, though Penelo only sees him as the vaguest blur in her periphery.

Vayne takes her in with a single glance, like she always imagined he would. A fancy dress is no armor against it - she might as well be stripped bare. He seems surprised, but only a little bit, curious and quietly amused in a way she realizes she's seen before. Larsa's gaze is very much like this - _so they are brothers, after all_ - Penelo thinks, stupidly, except that the Lord Consul's surprise quickly turns to a cool regard. The way that snakes look at mice, savoring the inevitable.

It's not fair. It's just not fair, this close to escape. With so long since she's had anything of substance to eat and even longer since she's slept. Tossed from country to country, ground to sky and back again, as if she's anyone of importance. Who is she, to stand here now, knowing she ought to do the smart thing, or the brave thing, but with no idea of what that's supposed to be?

The only thing she knows for sure is that her fingertips have gone cold and tingling, and that what she's feeling more than anything in this impossible moment is a strange sense of relief. This is as bad as it can ever possibly get, this is everything she's ever feared the most, and it's finally happening so at least she doesn't have to worry anymore.

The Lord Consul speaks, but Penelo's rather glad she can't hear him past the sudden roaring in her ears, as the world politely fades away.


	31. the law of probability 7

Vayne wakes with the notion that he's been dreaming one of Cid's dreams by accident. A landscape of complicated calculations and delicate adjustments, with all the secrets of the universe well within his reach. The truth of it all is beautiful and elegant, and so simple that he wants to laugh, but even before he can open his eyes the best is already gone, the rest blurred and fading fast. It's hardly the first time he's woke in the middle of some complicated thought, working out the nuances of a speech or a difficult proposal. Except it hadn't been that sort of problem - and he's not staring at the ceiling of his room, or even one of the spare rooms at Draklor.

He's covered in only a thin blanket, which would not be nearly enough if he were in Archades but he is not - ah yes, Dalmasca. The place the Senate and the Emperor have finally decided to be rid of him, at least for as long as they can.

_People of Rabanastre, we've occupied your homeland so they'd have somewhere to put me. My sincerest apologies._

He reaches up to rub a hand over his eyes, only to stop instantly at the wave of cold, piercing agony that ripples from shoulder to fingertip, enough that his breath catches in the wake of it. Vayne remembers then the reason he'd woken up thinking so hard - because the world's going to end, and he's the only one who knows it.

_The Dynast-King. You walked with the Dynast-King._

If he wished, it would be simple enough to call it a dream, some aftermath of the battle and those last few jumbled hours more than enough to conjure such a fantasy. He should put it aside, the application of just little common sense against such a ridiculous suggestion whittling it down until it might be easily ignored.

Unfortunately, if Vayne wishes to be so contrary, there's the counter-argument of a full round's worth of Midlight Shard still burning in his shoulder. The reminder that none of this started in the realm of the familiar or the sane, so there is no reason to expect it now. It does not do for great men to overlook matters of prophecy, though from what Vayne knows neither action or inaction may end in his favor.

If this does not end in his favor, then Archadia is no more.

He dresses as quickly as he can with his shoulder still throbbing, even turning his head more of a challenge than it ought be. The room is somewhat stuffy - no windows, and given all that's happened he can hardly blame whoever took such precautions, but with a bit of luck he can change that sooner rather than later. The sunrises in Archades can be nearly scandalous in their beauty, and it will be interesting to see how his new city compares.

At least it is still early, he's lost barely half a day and with any luck most of that has still been too chaotic for anyone else to accomplish much.

"My lord," a soft voice says, as soon as he opens his door. A soldier, or at least the appearance of one. Vayne has not had a chance to develop many contacts in Rabanastre, at least none that he is sure to trust, but there is still a great deal of use in those he has brought with him. "You wished for news of Nalbina."

_By the gods, Cid, but your boy works fast._

"Tell me."

"We have report of an escape. Four convicts, out of the prison through the underground passages. No sign of them yet, but should they survive, we assume they will return to Rabanastre."

"Four?"

"Three recent arrivals - and an unnamed prisoner from the lower levels. One under Judge Magister Gabranth's domain."

_Works fast and plays dirty._ No question, of just who that unknown prisoner might be. It's rather ambitious for Balthier's first move, but it certainly makes his intentions clear. Vayne does not envy anyone in the same room as Gabranth, when he discovers his brother's unexpected departure.

"What of the lady… Amalia, was it?"

He's not even sure why he bothers with the charade, although if that attack was the very best she could manage after two years of planning, Princess Ashelia might as well stay in her grave.

"Well sequestered aboard the _Ifrit. _It has not been yet decided, if the Emperor will choose to keep her outside Archades to be questioned. Judge Magister Ghis has been somewhat… circumspect regarding her capture, and the acquisition of the Dusk Shard."

Of course he has. What is the value of a pat on the head when the entire Empire - if not the world itself - lies within his reach?

Now there's a devil's bargain - would he prefer to see Archadia utterly undone by the Princess of Dalmasca, or watch what the Empire would become, were the Judge Magister allowed to remake it as he saw fit?

_Do be quick about this, Balthier. Ghis is already too fond of his ambitions._

Where will they go, once the sky pirate enacts his daring rescue? Rozarria, perhaps? Or will the princess truly believe Ondore has been waiting to help her? Vayne hopes so, with a little more spite than is dignified. It's only fair, if everyone else is to be dragged into this then the Marquis deserves to lose his share of sleep as well.

Ondore will use her. There is no reason to think him ignorant of a single circumstance, and so he will use the girl to get whatever she is capable of bringing him - an alliance with Rozarria? A mandate for war from Bur-Omisace, giving Bhujerba all but the obligation to secede?

No - the Dawn Shard. The Marquis will send her to fetch it for him, and why not? Vayne is hardly the only one certain it lies within Raithwall's tomb, that has been common conjecture for longer than he's been alive. Every country has sent teams to that crypt, feigning archeological studies or historical research, even a convoluted excuse for weapons testing. All of them so eager - save King Raminas, who needed to send no one.

_"It is no power, only folly and… heartbreak past enduring."_

He had died, rather than sacrifice his enemies for victory. All of Archadia owes him their lives, and none of them will ever know to be grateful. Vayne cannot pay that back - there is no paying that back. The only thing he can do now is to be the best steward he can with the time that he has - and destroy the Sun-Cryst, before it can do any more damage to the world.

Before Ashelia of Dalmasca finds it, and makes a ruin of them all.

"Judge Magister Gabranth has reached my brother in Bhujerba?"

"Yes, milord."

At least Larsa will be there, then, to give the man a duty to attend to, and mitigate the worst of his moods.

The ultimate fate of fon Rosenberg had always been a loose end, and Vayne has never been fond of those. But the Emperor had left it entirely in his hands - did not wish to hear the name Nalbina in the court - and Vayne hesitated to discard anything that might guard from future treachery. Gabranth had never stated it outright - never stated anything outright - but it was very clear that he wished for his brother to suffer a great deal further than what a simple death could bring. Stripping his brother of honor and home and all hope was still not quite enough to balance the scales between them.

Vayne is familiar with the long borders of time and history that enmity can draw, and even so Gabranth's bitter hate is a vast domain. He has never seen reason to press the issue - if a measure of the Judge Magister's loyalty could be bought at so spare a price, then why not let him gnaw and worry at the bones of his brother's defeat for as long as he wished?

It's almost amusing, in a way. Gabranth is only half-Archadian, though Landis has long since been absorbed into the Empire. A distinction without merit, for anyone less than a Judge Magister. If he had not fought so hard to reach so high, no one would have cause or care to judge him wanting. It is his pride alone that wounds him, his obsession with revenge that drives him, and also what might prove to do him the greatest harm.

If that does not make him a true Archadian than nothing will.

"Where is Doctor Cid?"

"In the air as we speak. He should reach Rabanastre no later than midday." The slightest bit of warmth edges the formal tone. "The doctor asked for me to relay a personal message."

"Oh, did he now?"

"He wished to say, 'I told you so.'"

"A sage for the ages," Vayne says, nearly smirking. He wonders if Cid had his bags already packed, just waiting for the call. "Keep me informed on the situation aboard the_ Ifrit_, or if the Marquis should do anything of interest. Have you any news of Rabanastre?"

"All quiet, for the moment. It seems many of those who were not captured have seen it wise to retreat elsewhere for now. The city is yours, Lord Consul."

"Yes, well." He doesn't try to hide the smile now. "The day is yet young."

* * *

The Imperial palace inspires a great deal of insularity for those nobles and courtiers who call it home. It is entirely possible to live one's life without ever needing to step outside its doors, and certainly there is little need for anyone who lives in Tsenoble to consider venturing elsewhere.

A world of familiar faces and common understandings. Codes of conduct and manners that have barely changed a whit in over a hundred years. If not for the occasional murder or scandal, it would always be excruciatingly dull, instead of usually so. At least the nearest open window is rarely more than thirty feet away, when a boring conversation finally proves one too many to bear.

The palace at Rabanastre keeps far less to itself, if for no other reason than it shares common ground with the city and everyone in it. The city wears its history well, unlike Archades, which never seems to be as much itself as when it is half-constructed, or tearing bits and pieces down so it may begin anew.

However, it is just as obvious that the city has not needed to defend its walls from invaders for many years, nothing besides a bit of Jagd here and there to impede any real attack from the skies. If Rozarria were to push - well, Vayne has no doubt he could have his Eighth Fleet back with a simple request. The Emperor would surely allow it to defend their newest province, but that would also mean bringing at least one Judge Magister along to command it. Only the smallest step from there, to Gramis extending his most benevolent protection, and then Bergan would be reporting on his every word and deed, or at least as far as his vocabulary would allow.

Trading one leash for the next, and Vayne will not have it so. No one has set terms for him in a very long time, not in Archadia and certainly not here.

His detractors no doubt assume he will spend his first days in Rabanastre lazing about like a proper Imperial ponce, throwing banquets and thinking up ways to ruin the citizens when he isn't too busy dallying with the chambermaids. If he's not a man for war and martial punishments, then it must be taxes and tariffs, Dalmasca paying heavily for the privilege of its subjugation.

His allies… no, such optimism is pointless at present, but there is still a fastidious path Vayne might choose to walk, and curry some favor. A light breakfast in his study, perhaps scheduling presentations from some of the more agreeable guests at the fete. A slow, modest and carefully tempered entrance into the politics of Rabanastre, the actions of a sensible man who wishes to build a stable foundation.

Vayne steals a pear from the nearest bowl in the hall, has it done with in three bites and tosses the core into the bushes as he steps out into the gardens. If he waits, if he is prudent and careful and all those fine things, then this whole day will be nothing but restlessness, enduring false concerns for his well-being in a long, pointless dance of formality. All of his decisions will be made through second-hand information, from advisors who - for good or ill - wish to mitigate the information he's receiving. If he's going to live in Rabanastre by proxy, he might as well let them run everything.

It's not worth being cautious, even if he wished to be. A single, well-cast spell will likely be enough to kill him now, perhaps even one intended to come to his aid. So truly, there is only one sensible avenue open to him - just his luck it also happens to be the most interesting one.

Vayne moves toward one of the palace's less impressive exits at speed, unsurprised at the double take that greets him upon arrival.

"Good morning, gentlemen."

"Ah… good morning, your Excellency." The first soldier, at least, recovers quickly, snapping up to a professional attention even though he hadn't been all that much at ease. The second soldier takes a little longer to get over his surprise, but is soon to follow suit.

"Good morning, Lord Consul. Is this an inspection?"

"I suppose that would be the responsible thing to do," Vayne says, taking a moment to examine their post. The security here is certainly solid enough, for what it is, although it seems unlikely anyone would bother with such an infiltration when no one had yet determined that they'd discovered every secret route below the palace. Balthier and his companion had found their way in by skybike, which did not at all surprise him but suggested that the walls were all a perfunctory display of security at their best. Still, that was hardly the fault of these soldiers, their faceplates up now and nervously waiting for his approval. He really does need to do something about that full-armor requirement, and sooner rather than later.

"It seems all is as it should be. I believe we shall see no trouble from this quarter," Vayne says, and keeps walking. He's half expecting them to just let him go, assuming that he knows what he's doing, and that it's vastly more sensible than what it /looks/ like he's doing, but a few steps away he hears a creak and shuffle, the hesitant clearing of a throat.

"Ah… sir? Is there something that you need?"

"Only a slight change of scenery. It seems it will be a fine day."

"Yes, Lord Consul. Certainly, but…" The soldier is looking around for the guard that ought to be there, not quite sure that there's one inexplicably hidden but waiting for him. Vayne imagines there will be a more than a bit of panicked rushing about in his absence. If not for his damned shoulder, he might have done a better job of it just going over the wall. "When should I tell them you'll be back, sir?"

"I wouldn't tell them anything until you have to."

By the time the guard can think up an answer to that, Vayne's already gone. He certainly pities 'them', whoever 'they' are, for having to endure the sort of ridiculous, irresponsible Lord Consul who'd just walk off alone into the streets


	32. the law of probability 8

Being a twice-successful fratricide has led to certain benefits, even beyond the simple matter of his own survival. At first, the Emperor hadn't wished to be reminded of all that had occurred, so Vayne returned only to be tossed back into the distant countryside. Fostered off to a succession of noble families in this or that secluded corner of the Empire, save for those moments where Gramis had been paranoid enough to haul him back to the palace - an ornamental dog on a too-tight leash. At the time, Vayne had not known what to think. Hadn't he done exactly as he'd been required to do? What had he missed and where was the mistake?

It was funny to think he'd ever been so naive, not to realize that success could easily be as grave an error as failure. Fortunately, there had been some good to come from the Emperor's unseemly pangs of conscience. The families he'd been tossed to had little idea what of what to do with him, and the rumors of why he'd been sent away had arrived well before he'd touched down, so Vayne had mostly been left alone. Apart from the fear of being held responsible should he come to harm, no one actually cared what he did, and there was little they could do in any case but urge him to be cautious.

So he went out, wherever he might be, to see what the world had to tell him. Vayne walked through towns and villages, talking to farmers and smiths. He'd even helped out a baker for a week, before the duchess he'd been attached to caught word of it and had him hurried home. Vayne has always been curious, and it seemed to amuse the men and women he'd met more often than not, a noble-born boy asking so many questions, wanting to know how a stone wall went together, or what made one potion more potent than the next.

All his thoughts back then had been troubling ones - anything different was a relief, and the less familiar the better. Years have passed since he was that boy, and yet how little has truly changed.

Vayne has to be out here. Rabanastre is his city now, and this is exactly the gauntlet he threw down in that pretty little speech, that he wasn't going to be some useless Archadian imbecile content to rule from a distance, unknown and unseen until it was time to make yet another fancy, meaningless pronouncement. A few hours on the streets where he can be seen and known won't change the world, but at least it is not what anyone expects him to do, and Vayne will not be afraid - they do not deserve it.

The city is yet quiet, nearly silent in the dawn, the barely-risen sun casting soft colors against the walls. It makes the whole world seem fragile, as if everything's been painted on the side of an eggshell. The air is thick with the promise of a hot, unforgiving day, but for the moment things are not uncomfortable. No airships are back in the skies, only a few Archadian troop carriers hanging at the borders. If they haven't reopened the aerodrome by the end of the day, he'll have to make it his first executive order. Vayne should probably make it a point to visit, actually, once he's through with whatever it is he thinks he's doing.

The next matter of importance, of course, is how the Occuria will get to their new avatar, if they haven't already made their move. Cid had never had a clear answer from Venat on just how he'd been chosen, or how the others of its kind saw fit to bide their time. Raithwall had mentioned something, a warning linked to the Shard sleeping in his tomb. It must have been how Raminas knew what he did, and surely there must be something keeping the Occuria at bay all this time or Archadia would long have been banished from memory.

Balthier will reach the princess, and Basch fon Rosenberg will be ready to confirm anything she doesn't already know as fact - his betrayal and her father's murder by Vayne's own command, and from there - from there the Shard, and what Raithwall intended as warning will seem to Ashelia as perfect opportunity. Vayne saw the look in her eyes, facing him at the palace - the princess wants nothing more than to kill him herself, but before that she will see him hurt as she has hurt, and damn the consequences.

Might there be some way, then, to separate his fate from that of his country? If he can somehow convince Ashelia to take her revenge on him alone, to see him dead in whatever gruesome way will satisfy and return to her throne without ever having to gain the Sun-Cryst's power?

It would be an honor to die for the sake of Archadia - empty, foolish words but damned if Vayne doesn't believe them, further down than anyone even thinks he can go. A good death, as such things went, one that the princess could grant him without even knowing she did so - but even then, there is still the matter of Larsa, and the Senate. He cannot save his country from annihilation only to know the Empire is still doomed to rot from within, that his brother would stand to receive such a poisoned inheritance.

… and what could stop Ashelia of Dalmasca from siding with Rozarria, even after his death? One Shard is all she needs, and then it is only to marry one of the Queen's many sons, heed his counsel and watch Archades burn.

Vayne takes a deep breath, smelling incense and charcoal and roasting meat. The light above him is colored now through bits of pretty cloth suspended on the overhangs, stretched from side-to-side across the street or on awnings over the windows high above. He passes open windows and doors at street level with the sounds of the morning meals being prepared in the rooms beyond, children being scolded out of bed and plans being made. It reminds him a bit of Nilbasse, through there are no further stages of the city to rise above it, and the sky looks strange and empty without their towering heights.

Of course he knows great spans of Rabanastre's storied history, the people and events that led to the great unfurling of the rest of the Empire, but even the most impressive texts cannot replace the feel of the uneven stones beneath his feet. How it feels to reach out and run his hand along old tile and even older brickwork that has seen the passing of countless generations. The local builders say that most of the heavy maintenance happens beyond the walls of the city. Rabanastre itself is built on solid bedrock, just slightly higher than the arid plains around it, but the main roads are built on land not nearly so sturdy, all of it subjected to periods of heat, mudslide and drought that gleefully grind up even the most dedicated efforts to forge a path.

And the giant tortoises. One mustn't forget those.

Airship travel has done its part to put less traffic on those roads, but they are still the only way into the city for many of the outlying merchants, and this city lives by her trade.

A city which has existed nearly from the beginning of recorded time, under one rule or another. There is a natural resolve to the set of its stones, a wear that speaks of trials patiently endured and the passing of ages. Vayne stops just inside a low archway, an alcove that might hold a shop or two in an hour's time, or perhaps just a place where people gather for casual conversation. At the moment there are only intricately tiled floors, in a completely different pattern than the surrounding pillars, which are different still from the walls, a nearly bewildering mix of color and tessellation. Rabanastre is a patchwork in the way of a many-layered stone, each age adding a new detail to an endless chronicle.

_I witnessed the birth of your empire, and your rise to glory,_ the city says, if he cares to listen, _and I will remain long after all trace of you and yours is gone._

Footprints do not linger long in the sand, whether they be made by kings, commoners or conquerors.

"Do you like it? I find myself here quite often. It is very pleasant to walk before the sun is too high."

Vayne turns at the soft voice, the viera watching him with that odd look of casual diffidence they all seem to posses, as if nothing he could ever do would be of much more than a polite interest.

"Indeed, I do," he smiles, "and indeed, it is. Good morning."

"Good morning. My name is Ktjn."

"Vayne Solidor, at your service," he says, bowing slightly. The viera studies him, and he thinks it is certainly more in curiosity than suspicion.

"You are the new Lord Consul. The ruler of this city."

"I might say steward, but yes."

The viera shakes her head slightly, hair like strands of pure-spun starlight framing her face. A beauty so delicate and graceful it seems to ignore gravity, a trait all her people seem to share. A shame Vayne had been barely half-conscious in his short time in Eryut, without a chance to see things properly, though he was certain they had all preferred him that way.

As if she can hear his thoughts, as if she knows how he'd hoped to avoid getting too close to her kind, Vayne sees Ktjn's nose twitch and her eyes narrow slightly.

"You are likely smelling the labs on me," he lies. "I spend much of my time in Archades with men of science, who experiment with magicite and Mist in all its forms and combinations. We work as safely as we can, though it is the sort of work that demands some consequence." Cid's most accomplished acolytes can no longer count on even being healed as quickly as other men, though so far none of them have developed the total immunity to magic Vayne seems to have acquired. "If it disturbs you, I will take my leave."

"No. I am not troubled, it is just… strange. I am not so familiar with the ways of humes. It seems a great risk to take. What is the reward?"

It amuses him to consider the obvious answer - a slow and painful death - but it seems he has explained himself well enough to deflect any further concerns.

"I suppose it stands much the same as the reward for a viera who leaves her Wood. Have you found that worth the risk?"

Ktjn gestures to the path ahead, and Vayne is happy to step in alongside her. The city continues to wake up all around them, and Vayne gets more than a few stares from men and women leaving their homes, though when he nods a greeting they are usually quick to reciprocate. He isn't wearing his dress uniform, though his clothing is still cut for his station and should any overlook that, he has no doubt his accent is more than enough to catch their attention. The ones who weren't there to see him arrive will tell the ones who were, and if there's to be an angry mob prying out bits of the city to stone him down - well, sooner than later. If it's going to be that bad there's little use in waiting around.

"I do not yet know what my reward is, if that is what I ought call it," Ktjn says. "When I came this city, your Empire had just arrived, and things were… not as it seemed they ought be. I believed then I might have made a mistake, though my sister told me that humes are often as not in such chaos, and I should not pay it too much mind."

"Sister?"

From what little he knows, the viera use the word in two separate ways, concerning a common kinship for all of them but also more profound bonds, as those between hume siblings. The true viera language is a marvel of complex subtlety and nuance - rarely studied, and even those fortunate enough to find a viera who will allow them to ask questions admit their careful attempts still barely scratch the surface. It must be difficult for them to use the cruder, common language of Ivalice, as if moving from precise poetry to random words scrawled across back-alley walls.

"My sister Krjn works for the Centurio clan hall here in the city. I believe she was at the fete."

Vayne remembers her, the viera who looked fully capable of taking on both sides of the fight alone, had she found any interest in it. In light of that revelation, Ktjn's unarmored state and frank manner seem dangerously innocent, as if this is not only the first city she has seen at war but the first city she has seen _at all_.

"Yes. I spoke briefly with her partner Montblanc, just before the night grew… complicated."

"They tried to kidnap you," Ktjn says with the candor of someone with no reason to take any side in the fight, because it does not really matter. Rabanastre and Archadia are both well beneath her, to be observed and studied but not regarded as equal, or even sensible. Humes do as they will, no further explanation is necessary. A rather wonderful thing, to be put in one's place by someone who does not even know they are doing so.

"Kidnapping? And here I thought I merited an assassination attempt at least," Vayne says dryly, though Ktjn seems as impervious to sarcasm as she is all other hume behavior.

"No. I have listened to many speak on the streets since then, and they say the Resistance meant to capture you. You would be the way for them to negotiate terms with Archadia." The viera frowns slightly. "Is it wise for you to be out like this, if they were looking to trap you?"

"I doubt it," Vayne says, doing his best not to laugh as she tries to make sense of that, before deciding it must be just one more example of the inexplicability of humes. Really, the longer he's out here the less it seems he has anything to worry about. The Resistance has been thoroughly routed, and anyone left has to be more worried about reclaiming their princess than planning another attack. He has passed nearly as many Archadian soldiers on the streets as shopkeepers setting up for the day, both equally surprised to see him.

In Archades, the shops stratify right along with the rest of the city, the produce merchants keeping separate from the fishmongers who stay entire levels away from the sculptors and the artificers, both of whom are at a fair distance from the mages. The only things that bleed outside their invisible lines are the booksellers and the shipwrights, simply too many of either to keep them within any bounds.

Rabanastre, on the other hand, seems to have no bounds at all, and soon Vayne is surrounded on all sides by both the ordinary and the truly bizarre, a table loaded with candied fruit and nuts set next to one spilling over with coeurl pelts and carefully woven carpets. On his left, he has his choice of stones, rough marbles and granites in large slabs along with carefully polished statues in all sizes and colors, from milky quartzes to vibrant turquoise. On his right, what seems to be every bit of every animal that could ever be taken apart, shells and skins and a whole strand of transparent scales all strung together and clinking lightly in the wind.

Whole dried lizards, nearly as long as his arm, dangle across the awning at eye level. The shopkeeper sees him pondering the possibilities.

"Medical or delicacy?"

"Both, Lord Consul, depending on your need," The man says, and smiles when Vayne does. A little hesitant, a little nervous, but so far all anyone is doing is watching him as they work, as curious about him as he is about them. He thinks he catches a few frowns, some quick gestures from the corner of his eye. A bit of black market dealing being carefully shuffled out of his sight, perhaps, with warnings being passed on to others in the city about his unexpected visit. If an import from Rozarria had a three-hundred percent tariff hike coming in after the occupation, Vayne would probably take his chances with smuggling it in too.

The main source of that particular problem seems to stem from Lowtown - the source of many problems, he has been told, but also the home of many of those displaced since Archadia's arrival into the city, including a significant number of orphans.

Sending out armored troops after children, now _there's_ the way to make them think him less of a monster.

Tucked in between a weapons booth and a clothing stall is a long stand of spices, and Vayne spends some time politely frightening the woman selling her wares, though he makes up for it by buying six different sorts of pepper, a vial of saffron and a packet of juniper berries, along with a small bag of a resinous, fragrant wood that's supposedly good for smoking meat over. It seems to be a popular item everywhere in the city. He wonders if they'd used it at the fete, tempted to ask Ktjn if she knows where to find Migelo's shop, although paying the bangaa a surprise visit now would just be cruel.

The path through the bazaar loops back on itself, more crowded with every step though the people do grant him a bit of space. Rabanastre's people are as diverse as the goods they sell, a fair mix of moogles and humes, with more bangaa and seeq than he's seen in quite some time. Ktjn steps onto a side street, and Vayne follows and everything is quiet, calm and still. He has been here for over an hour now and is yet remarkably unmurdered.

"On my journey to Rabanastre, there were many people who liked to watch me. My sister says humes believe us to be very beautiful," Ktjn says, with a complete lack of self-consciousness. "They watch you too - but they are afraid. Why?"

"I would call it wariness, perhaps. I am yet unknown. If some new beast came to your Wood and made itself at home, would you not be cautious until you knew it meant you no harm?"

"Of course, but you are not a beast. You are only a hume, as they are."

Again Vayne finds himself fighting a smile, for how easily he is put in his place.

"True, but they do not watch you for your own sake either. The greater world has so few viera in it - you are a mystery. A representative for all your people, for how they act and what they believe in, whether you intend it or no. I do not stand alone - I am here on behalf of all the Empire, and so Dalmasca looks for its future in all that I do and say. It is not so vast a difference as that between your world and ours, but it is enough."

Ktjn is quiet, contemplating his words as they reach the end of the street, which opens into another main road bursting with shops and another crowd of people surprised to see him, though the day is busy enough now that they have other business to keep them occupied, that the stares are infrequent and any whispers intermingle with a shifting current of gossip. The cathedral looms up over the rooftops, and though there are shadows cast they do very little against the heat, which is finally out in full force, baking down on everything.

"Archadia is great and powerful, and so it has conquered this country, and you rule where once there was a king." Ktjn says quietly as they step into an alcove. "Dalmasca fought to keep this from happening, but your Empire was stronger, and now you will do what you wish with this land and these people. It is no longer its own land, only a part of yours - I do not know the word for this."

"I would say protectorate, were it mine to name."

Ktjn tips her head slightly. "You are very careful with your words."

"I only hope I may choose the deeds to match them."

Vayne will be expected to make this whole venture pay for itself, of course, but he hasn't made a sport of shaking down budgets to think he can't manage it this again. Unsurprisingly, it will all come down to the airships. The more he can shift that trade to Rabanastre - even a quarter of the builds would be enough for Dalmasca to hold its own within the Empire. As a country it is neither large nor with any particular financial demands. So far, if Vayne were to give its people any advice it would be to offer itself up as an exotic desert oasis and take rich Archadian tourists for every gil they had.

"What does it mean, then, if this is to be a… protectorate?"

It means a truth he cannot speak, of the strategic, simple value of Dalmasca - of the Imperial need to occupy simply so that Rozarria could not take it first. It means that for all their bravery and sacrifice King Rasler and all his men and armies had died for that and little more. Even if they had successfully repelled Archadia, Rozarria would have swept in before they could recover. An inevitable defeat, crushed between tyrants, all for the sake of a few inches on a map. Hardly the sort of truth to inspire a poet, let alone comfort a grieving widow, or impress a curious viera.

Ashelia will be merciless, and there is some justice in it, he cannot argue that. Gods, but the price-

"It means I am here to serve, rather than to be served. Rabanastre belongs to its people, it is only my duty to listen to them and do my best to help where and when I can. As you say - we are great and we are powerful, but strength means very little if Archadia is not wise enough to rule as it ought. Dalmasca's fate these past few years has been neither fair nor kind, but I am determined that she shall not suffer so again."

Ktjn looks at him, a sort of calculating stare that could mean anything. Vayne wonders what had called her from her home, a place of peace and bounty so absolute that all of this is foreign to her, wars and merchants and humes. He wonders, not at all for the first time, what it might mean that her Wood - whatever it is and whatever it knows - had chosen to gift him a bit more life.

She turns away from the shops, up a side street where the noise quickly dwindles to nothing, the alleys in between the buildings narrow enough in places that he might almost touch both walls with his arms extended. He wonders if she might know the way to Lowtown, if she would be amenable to taking him there or if Krjn would strangle him with his own waistcoat for suggesting such a thing. The way the upper levels speak of Old Archades, one would think it was nothing but endless slaughter, a bit of stolen coin passed from hand to hand as each thief was killed by the next. The truth is not half so exciting or bloody, and there is no reason to believe it is any different here.

Vayne glances behind him - he can still see the cathedral, a good marker through these maze-like streets - and when he's turned back Ktjn is standing in an open doorway, looking back to make sure he's following before she steps inside.

One breath and Vayne knows exactly where he is, the hot smell of metal and oil with the cool tingle of magicite beneath. The stones in the walls are dark with scorch marks, wood beams covered so thick with years of accumulated grime there's no sign left of the grain. Every inch of space is well-worn and full of what has been useful and may be again, machinery stacked on top of itself, arranged in various bundles of chaos vaguely according to size. Draklor's facilities may be larger and better equipped but otherwise it's much the same, from the pile of dog-eared texts propped up against a random chunk of metal to the numerous gouges in the floors and tables, the sort of damage that seems to accrue even in Draklor's newest workrooms overnight.

It's an artificer's shop, not where Vayne belongs but a world he's borrowed, comfortable and familiar. Behind a tall stack of boards, he can hear the sound of a hammer strike, the soft hiss of metal in water.

"Taneli?" Ktjn calls. "Are you busy?"

The work stops. "Never too busy to talk to you, Ktjn. You're here early. If Krjn's still looking for those crystals she wants, I ought to have word any day now."

The man sounds young, and happy, though it's difficult to imagine anyone who wouldn't welcome a viera's visit.

"You had said that you were having trouble with a water pump, that the Archadians were not allowing you to make repairs."

Taneli lets out a half-laugh, and he can hear tools being set down, and footsteps coming closer

"Ktjn, no one as beautiful as you needs to be half as interested in my problems. It's like I told your sister, the bastards said two weeks three months ago, and there's nothing to be done. If we sneak in to do the work, they'll just undo it all and call it sabotage - that's what happened in the north quarter last time. So unless you've found a way to get that Lord Consul of theirs-"

Vayne has some idea what to expect when Taneli turns the corner. Sturdy boots with thick soles, a work apron perhaps. Maybe a shirt with the sleeves rolled up, or just a sleeveless undershirt, or perhaps no shirt at all. Warm enough for it, as long as he's not working with anything that's likely to spark. He's expecting scars, burn marks, the signs of a life spent bending metal and magicite to one's will and being bent by it in turn.

It's unexpected to see that the man's missing his right arm entirely, the elbow tapering off to empty space, though Vayne doubts it's anywhere near the surprise of having a Lord Consul at the door.

He really is kind of a bastard.

"Good morning.


	33. the law of probability 9

Vayne's final speech before departing for Dalmasca had been a petition long in the making, an attempt to formalize the worth of Draklor's most devoted craftsmen. It was possible for a Judge, by exceptional service and loyalty to the Empire, to earn a title of his own, a House rank for his family name. Vayne could vouch that the shipwrights put themselves at risk even outside of wartime, so there seemed no reason that their years of noble endeavor could not someday be worthy of the same reward.

If he listened close enough, he might still hear the screams of outrage. At least he'd left the Empire something to remember him by. No chance in hell that the nobles of Archades would raise an artificer to their ranks, even if they were the ones who'd built them a way to look down on the world.

It's no surprise, then, that Archadian nobles would get in the way of what needs to be done in Rabanastre. A good thing, that Vayne can guess the extent of the problem, because Taneli's gone silent as a stone. The mechanic is as young as he sounds, fair-haired with dark eyes that stare at him for another moment before glancing around the room, perhaps to start cataloguing all the items that might stave an Archadian's head in, or perhaps just to convince himself this is actually happening.

He might have lost that arm in some accident of industry, but Vayne doubts it. Which means he won't be making many more friends today.

"Well…" the man finally shakes himself out of his shock, "I suppose I should put a shirt on, seeing as you're the Lord Counsel and all."

"Don't trouble yourself on my account."

A slight frown that says Taneli's gone from wondering if this is real to wishing it weren't, and he disappears again. Ktjn, however, seems quite satisfied with the outcome. Vayne assumes this is how it works in her Wood - he has called himself leader, she has brought him a problem to be solved and now it is his duty to solve it. All is as it ought be.

"We should speak again, you and I," she says. "I have not been in Archades, and would like to hear of it."

"I imagine you have some tales of your own travels to share," Vayne gives her another gracious half-bow, as Taneli and his shirt make their reappearance. "At present, I fear I shall be somewhat occupied, but do feel free to call on the palace at your leisure."

Ktjn makes her goodbyes to the mechanic, and leaves, though the awkwardness that remains has a presence all its own. If all the stilted silences of his life were laid out end-to-end, Vayne might never need to speak again.

"You needed help, Consul?" Taneli finally offers.

"I believe the point of all this was to offer my assistance to you."

"Ktjn… isn't used to humes."

Which means _if you hurt her I will gut you_ as well as _you can stop pretending you care now_. It certainly isn't that Vayne's any sort of humanitarian. He's every bit the bloodless bastard they all suspect he is, but that hardly changes the situation. If it's what it sounds like, and there's three months of problems in Rabanastre that five minutes of his attention and authority can fix, he'd be a blithering idiot for not taking the time to do so.

"You're having trouble making repairs? I might be able to assist."

Taneli studies him for a moment more, making some quiet judgment call, weighing how little he trusts his new Lord Consul against the possibility of getting things done. Vayne is pleased to see it, when pragmatism wins out.

"Let me get my gear, and I'll show you."

"Lead the way."

* * *

Taneli moves quickly down the narrow back alleys, with pipes of all sizes snaked along the buildings, twisting over and around their path like creeping vines. The markets and shops are gone, the few glimpses of wider streets Vayne gets seem residential, even industrial in places. A less scenic view of Rabanastre, but likely the more useful.

"Do you know the man in charge of this area?"

"I never spoke with him," Taneli says, in a tone that makes Vayne wish to see the look on his face, which is likely why the other man keeps his eyes forward. "One of your Judges told me I had to write up a request for a survey team, who'd pass along their findings to the head engineer who'd bring it to the district's High Marshall who needed permission from… I don't know."

The Lord Regent, Vayne thinks, who'd been out of his office and on a ship back to Archades before the ink had dried on the official transferral of powers. A good third of those in charge of the districts Rabanastre's been portioned into haven't ever left Archadia, preferring to do their half-assed job through equally half-assed proxies.

"I did what I could, but come to find out the work's on a 'border' with another one of your districts, and that meant another Marshall and engineer and survey team…" Taneli shakes his head, the frustration obviously his closest companion as of late.

It might be simple lazy incompetence, bolstered by the ever present Imperial bureaucracy. A minor official somewhere might be making too much money contracting repairs to care about what isn't getting done. Or perhaps one of the Marshalls is refusing to be helpful in the hopes it will look bad for his neighbor. For all Vayne knows, there's a long-standing fight back in Archades somewhere and this is somehow the latest consequence.

"I know it is not much consolation, but I have seen this before."

Taneli does not answer. Vayne can guess at what he's thinking - _how did you idiots ever manage to conquer anything_ or perhaps _so this is what we have to look forward to as Imperial citizens_ but he only shifts the bag of gear he'd packed a little higher on his shoulder. Vayne is honestly intrigued to see what's inside, Draklor's own mechanics rabidly protective of their kits, all carefully chosen and cultivated the way a master gardner might tend to his best plots, with many of the tools handcrafted to some particular end.

"It has been two years since the end of the war." Vayne says. "Has there been no attempt to engage the services of Rabanastre's own guilds?"

Taneli snorts, an answer in itself. "Of course not. They're too afraid we might blow up our city instead of fixing it."

A justified concern, maybe, though Vayne imagines it's been used far more often as a blanket excuse for indifference.

The alleys turn into streets, which turn into wider avenues and in a few moments more they're in a larger courtyard bordered by poorer homes, the tiles and fancy brickwork replaced with intricate but far cheaper designs painted directly on the walls. The work in question is obvious, a large mechanism half-submerged in a pool of dirty water in the center of the yard. A young boy sits beneath an overhang, perhaps hiding from the heat, and looks up when Taneli calls to him.

"Go and get Cadry for me. Tell him to bring his gear. We're fixing the pump."

"He's up north. Putting the roof back on his cousin's house, after those ship cannons shook it off," The boy says, getting to his feet, "I thought you weren't allowed to work on it. Soldiers'll come for you."

"Not today," Taneli says, pointing his handless limb in Vayne's direction as he lets his tool bag hit the ground. The boy looks at him, no telling if he knows or cares what a Lord Consul's good for but Vayne's still Archadian and that's explanation enough to satisfy.

* * *

Rabanastre has more than one way of getting water to the people, but in a desert every one of them is necessary, and Vayne glances around, wondering how they've made up for the lack of what seems to be the main source of water for all the houses he can see.

"The next pump's about a dozen blocks away. They've had to carry their water back here a bucket at a time. It takes most of the day." Taneli says without looking up, lining his tools up at the edge of the murky pool before taking the plunge. The water comes up a little higher than mid-calf, shallower than it looks. Vayne's not going to pretend he understand much of what he's looking at, though the mechanic seizes on the task as if he's been planning his avenue of attack for ages, which is likely true.

"A bit old-fashioned, isn't it?" Vayne says, studying the well-worn machine.

Taneli smiles, not looking up. It's a smirk, really, now that they're here and he's got his work to focus on. The reason Vayne goes to the labs rather than having the shipwrights coming to him, because they're far less nervous answering questions when on familiar territory.

"It means we can fix it when it breaks. If it's too new, some fancy piece of… useless, not worth repairing. A system like this, if you keep on it, it'll last."

The implication's perfectly clear, that the Archadians and their inattention have caused many more problems like this one, by not allowing the work to be done by those who know how to do it.

The man is fast and has obviously learned to compensate for his missing arm, but the work still isn't easy and he swears more than once under his breath as he works. Vayne sees the problem coming well before it happens, as Taneli wrestles with a large piece of pipe at eye level, trying to balance it while he's uncoupling it and even if he had both hands to help it wouldn't really be enough. The man needs a team to do a proper job of this, but he's not about to waste a minute waiting, at the risk of the Lord Consul just as suddenly changing his mind.

The pipe begins to wobble - and so Vayne drops down into the pool, to catch it before any further damage can be done. One more of those awkward pauses follows, a pointed sort of disbelief with a glance at his fancy coat and gloves now draped over an obliging bit of railing and his fancy boots halfway submerged in water so filthy it looks like he's standing in solid concrete.

"They're waterproof. I think." Vayne smiles. "I'm not trained for the craft, but I'm told I take directions well enough."

It's clear Taneli wants to say about fifteen different things, half of which are baffled and none complimentary, but he also wants to finish the job, and so it doesn't matter what the Lord Consul thinks he's playing at. Vayne does as he's directed, bracing equipment or holding bits of what's been ground down or rusted past repair, handing over tools as they're needed. He doesn't have to ask which one is which, and it doesn't go unnoticed, though the man keeps his opinions to himself.

"Oi! Taneli!"

Vayne glances over his shoulder at the sound of footsteps - the boy from before is back, wandered off to return with one of his young friends, and what might be the second boy's sister, an older girl in threadbare, grease-stained coveralls and a bag of her own. Introductions are made - she lives around the corner, and heard of what was going on - "didn't think we needed a Lord Consul to get a well repaired, but we'll take it" - and with that there's three of them making quick work on the machine, though Vayne soon steps back to make room for the professionals as one more shows up, and then another loaded down with tools, as if some silent signal is pinging its way through the city.

He's seen this sort of spontaneous gathering in the labs, whenever there's an engine to overhaul or any piece of new or complex machinery being poked at. A handful of shipwrights soon becomes a crowd, all discussing their various projects as well as whatever work is at hand, each with an opinion on how it might be done better, faster, cheaper or twice as powerful. Soon there's more men and more tools and Vayne is back to where he was at the fete, shaking hands and answering nervous questions and being stared at, while the younger boys get started on a sort of bucket brigade, to lower the filthy water and give the artificers more room to work.

"You there! What do - I've warned you all about this, more than once!"

Vayne had wondered when the guard would show up, if they planned on showing up at all, and it seems his curiosity is finally rewarded. Two soldiers in full armor stomp up the alley, though the one doing the talking doesn't sound angry as much as irritated.

"I've _told_ you before, you can't just… I know it's difficult but there's a system for this sort of work and the rules have to be followed. Now you're all going to have to-" He stops short when he sees Vayne among those he's castigating, the crowd parting around him in one great, silent wave. It's quiet enough to hear the muttered curse bounce off the inside of his armor. "L-Lord Consul? I didn't- sir, we weren't notified…"

"I was in the area, and had heard there'd been a bit of a problem. It seems these things sort themselves out more quickly when I attend to them myself."

"I… y-yes sir. Of course. Very good." They both pretend not to hear any soft snickers from the Dalmascans.

"Get one of your men to inform the Marshalls to bring me the paperwork so that I can formalize all this. Also, relay the message that I wish for a joint meeting as soon as it can be arranged, to discuss the current state of city and the last six months worth of repairs."

Vayne wonders how much value there will be in such a gathering, but it will be entertaining enough to see what excuses they come up with, and how long it will take for them to start stabbing each other in the back.

* * *

The mood of the square is surprisingly close to festive as time passes, with children enlisted now and then to find replacement parts from some distant location, or curious neighbors peering out of this window or that. Vayne borrows a ledger and a pen and asks for a rough list of all else that needs to be repaired in Rabanastre - and he's well into the sixth page before he dares pause long enough to stretch his hand, even the soldiers chiming in with complaints they've heard of from their time guarding the city's front walls. It's slightly irksome, that the guard chooses to stay when they realize he is out here alone. It drives a bit of a wedge between him and the Dalmascans, when they were already so hesitant to approach him. At least these particular soldiers seem to be pleased not to have to enforce regulations they recognize as absurd. Speaking of…

"Are you wearing those helmets because you wish to, or because you have to?" Vayne asks.

"Orders, sir."

"You may consider those orders rescinded at your leisure."

"Ah… thank you, sir."

The helmets quickly come off, and the faces beneath are all young, strong, handsome and resolute. Perfect soldiers of Archadia. An artist flush with patriotic fervor could not paint a portrait more worthy.

Gods, the weight of that.

Vayne has to remember it, to remind himself of the realness of things - play in politics for too long and it all becomes theory and leverage, a man cut down to the dimensions of one more chip on the board, one more spiritless gamble to be won or lost when this is not the truth of it at all. He has to take extra precautions against himself, he knows this. Vayne must know, always, how and why people break, because he is a Solidor and Solidors must be more careful than other men. If there is anything they do better than power, it is hurting others without ever knowing it, effortlessly, like children who destroy their toys with indifferent malice, aware of only how easily they can be replaced.

If that is his destiny - if the difference between himself and Gramis is only one of time, then Vayne will at least do what he can to be cruel by choice.

"I hear Reveca got her hands on a tinblock, the one with the windstone struts?" One mechanic says to another, close enough to be overheard. "You can grind down the glossiairs to nubs if you race one of those, and they'll turn on a gil."

"They'll turn _over_ on a gil. Nothing like going full out when you've got zero stability," a third boy replies.

"What are the Esters working on these days?"

"A G-347. Modded with the long body and a five set of skystones on the outside edge. I hear they run them like that on the coast."

"What good will that do? Fanciest wreckage on the course?"

All of the mechanics present are around Taneli's age or even a few years younger, and there's barely an artificer of that age in Archades who doesn't have some interest in the skies. Most of those Vayne knows keep their own skybikes in a constant state of being built, rebuilt and customized. It's quite popular - if not practically mandatory - for a group to band together and purchase some space and a common bike to rebuild into a racer. He is rather certain half of Draklor only works for him so that they can use the shop tools for team projects in the after hours.

"I wonder," he says into a lull in the conversation, "if you might tell me how Rabanastre's shipwrights side on the issue of the adapted VKR-50 against the Rozarrian standard _Cielo Kator_."

In all honesty, Vayne does not quite understand the particulars, something to do with the way the Rozarrian bike processes its magickal power - it's a damn fast ship on the straights, so they say - versus the maneuverability and adaptability of the VKR, usually a treasure trove for aftermarket parts. What his question is, however, is a recursive, endless argument, like tossing raw meat to the sharks. He's heard the shipwrights at Draklor argue the costs and benefits of their favorite machines in a constant, detailed litany for _days_ at a time, only pausing now and then to admit some new rival onto the field of battle to be lauded or torn to pieces.

He is not one of them, but he has a passing grasp of the terrain.

"Well, Lord Consul," one of the mechanics says slowly, as if it might be a trick question, so hesitant to cause offense. "I would say for my money, the VKR is a far more flexible machine."

The slightest pause, they're obviously still cautious around him, but no one can let it stand for any longer than that.

"Flexibility's not worth much when you're three seconds late off the line."

"You can make up that three with the first corner, if you haven't built a brick."

Voices are protesting now that Vayne hasn't heard before, timidness falling away in the face of the challenge. There are meetings of the Senate less heated and far less precise than debates among shipwrights, and he is not at all surprised when someone decides to solve the problem of which is better by simply throwing another bike in the mix.

"Neither one of them is a Gully. A 272 Gully is the best bike out there."

"Best bike you're going to be walking home when the engine goes."

"I have never had the engine drop in my life. Were you drunk?"

"I didn't think a Lord Consul would care much for racing," Taneli speaks up, still hard at work, not even looking up as his voice carries above the chatter. Surprisingly, it silences the rest of them. There's suspicion in the mechanic's voice, calling him out on his attempt to fit in. A challenge. Vayne likes the sound of that.

"I have only been a Lord Consul for two days now. Before that, I had the privilege of being acquainted with the artificers of the Draklor Laboratories, in Archades."

"I know that place." A girl seated at the lip of the pit says, 'Theory and Practical Design as it Applies to the Modern Airship,' by Dr…. um.. Bunansa, right? We've got three more of his books at the shop dock at the Aerodrome."

So it is that Draklor once again provides him with unexpected avenues, and it doesn't take long before Vayne is being barraged on all sides with questions about the quality of equipment in the labs, the procedure for designing and building new racers, the materials they favor and how fast they'll go - even though no one quite believes the latest lap results. Vayne doesn't bother going into the details of what they'd been able to do with Nethicite, putting so much power in the engine that one of Cid's best had broken his wrist in two places just getting it off the line.

He'd been grinning like an idiot the whole time they'd been putting him back together.

"Is Draklor is responsible for your dreadnoughts, too? Like the one you had over the palace?" Taneli says, more than a little steel in his voice, and once again the rest of the group goes silent. Pushing, maybe. The moment Vayne takes offense, it will remind the rest of them who he is and what he stands for, that he's not at all the ally he's pretending to be.

"Every ship in the Imperial fleet goes through the lab first, and Draklor's artificers are often sent out to see to general maintenance and repair. The only thing they don't do is get to fly them - not that it stops them from asking," Vayne says. "The _Ifrit_ was sent here in the event of some unlikely air assault, in the hopes that just having it here would be enough of a deterrent. Unfortunately there was some miscommunication about its role in the ground defense of the palace. I was very glad to hear no civilians were injured during the attack."

Vayne doubts Taneli is convinced by that, but a few of the other mechanics look curious, or at least not openly hostile.

"It's my hope that Rabanastre will become a new staging ground for some of our more advanced ships. Once I get a clear view of how the city operates, I'd very much like to break ground - with new facilities, airfields, and equipment from Archadia until we can build our own here."

"Along with the Archadians to use it," Taneli mutters from the pit.

"At least a few, at first, or they'd get annoyed with me for keeping them out of the action. But surely you believe Dalmascan ships would be better built by Dalmascan hands?"

Vayne watches that thought hit them, the potential for exactly what he's offering and how far they might be able to take it. If one in five of them has been more than making ends meet these past two years, it's almost certainly under the table. He remembers this look, or something very close to it, the first time the build teams at Draklor had actually been paid what they were worth, what he'd been able to negotiate out from around a few hideously exploitative contracts.

Half of Archades thinks Vayne's made a deal with several different devils, but the secret to his success is really rather simple. Find the resources that no one else is using, the unappreciated and overlooked, and reward them for their efforts. He makes them rich, they give him power, credibility and authority. No one can deny the success of the trade.

"I… uh," the girl who's read a few of Cid's books says, "that is, Lord Consul… we heard that the Archadian army, that you…ah, conscript."

A soft snort from one of the soldiers behind him, and Vayne tries not to glare, hoping it might go unnoticed.

"We do not."

With any luck the relief from that will keep them from asking exactly why - because entry into the Archadian military is seen as a high honor, if not an obligation for anyone in the Empire proper. A symbol of status, and over twenty years later, even the former Republic of Landis is still not quite the Empire 'proper.' Only Archadia could conquer a nation only to look so far down its nose at its newest citizens. He hopes it will be different for Dalmasca, already so distant from the Empire, that they may be left to defend their own, the lack of any real Imperial interest excused away with some remark on the rigors of the desert sun and thin Northern blood.

"Maybe we should ask him about the race?" A mechanic speaks up - the one who'd championed the Gully, Vayne thinks. A few loaded looks pass between the whole group - even Taneli looks up, and it's obvious they don't want to ask him but it's also too late to take the question back. The boy who'd answered him, the one who'd preferred the VKR, takes charge once more.

"Well, Lord Consul, there's… we haven't had much of a chance to fly, lately."

Vayne can guess the extent of that understatement, but he raises a curious brow toward his volunteer bodyguard anyway, the soldier looking once again chagrined at the orders he's been following.

"Ah, the Lord Regent banned all non-registered skyship travel in and around Rabanastre. So… no racing, sir. At all."

For two years? Gods, it's amazing they haven't blown up the city out of sheer boredom by now.

"How else would I know which shipwrights to hire if I can't see how they build?" Vayne smiles, all but being handed the opportunity to win the city over. "I'll get your races back for you, if you promise to win."

A few gasps, some delighted laughs and a great deal of commotion, everyone either thanking him or chatting quickly to each other, what's probably been months of carefully considered dreams and abandoned goals given sudden, new life.

If Vayne hadn't been paying attention to the work being done, he'd have missed what happened next, though that was likely what Taneli had been hoping for.

The water crystal's not just cracked but completely shattered, they've been pulling shards of it free from the gears for a while. Vayne's been waiting for them to ask for a replacement, little use in a working system if the water hasn't been purified, and crystals aren't cheap - but instead Taneli reaches out to rummage quickly through his bag and Vayne can see three or four stones inside - water crystals, too clear to be recycled, a shocking blue.

It's rough magicite then, cut and polished, but that's no job for a simple jeweler. It takes skill to cut with the paths of the magic, to facet the gems in the way that they'll best amplify the magicks within. Vayne wonders who they're trading to and for what in order to acquire the crystals - and then Taneli whistles softly, and the gems begin to glow, one particular gem a bit more brightly than the rest, echoing back the high, clear note.

He has perfect pitch. It's hardly a necessary skill, but the shipwrights at Draklor who have it are all among the very best, a natural talent. Vayne's seen them use the same trick as a shortcut when they're trying to choose which stones to use where, the resonant frequencies important to the workings of a larger engine, too much dissonance enough to make the whole thing collapse. He's never heard of it being used to shape rough magicite, but it's hard to imagine those crystals come from anywhere else.

The rest of the mechanics are too busy with their own affairs, probably well used to the sight, and he wouldn't be surprised to learn that Taneli's playing down the skill. Especially when the other man notices him watching, and Vayne sees him flinch, quickly turning back to the last of his work.

It doesn't take long before the remaining water in the pool is sparkling clear, and the light trickle of water from the fountain - part of the now-working pump - is enough to make even the baking dust around them seem cool and welcoming.

* * *

"So, do you cut skystones as well?" Vayne asks, and in the quiet shop he can hear Taneli's breath catch.

The mechanic begged off following the others for their afternoon break, though he seemed unsurprised when Vayne chose to follow him, and they'd walked in silence all the way back to his small workshop. Now that Vayne knew what to look for, there were details everywhere of his second life as shipwright, bits and pieces of machinery that Vayne vaguely recognized as those most likely to burn out of a bike pushed past its limits.

"Where do you build your ships?" Taneli says nothing, but there's no point in not asking. "It doesn't seem you'd have enough room here."

"We rent a space down near the aerodrome. It's been mostly empty for a while now. I suppose that's not going to be the case for long, if what you said is true." He's guarded and cautious, picking up tools on a bench only to put them down again, glancing at Vayne from the corner of his eye. The soldiers have refused to abandon their guard, though the lack of space in the workshop has at least kept them outside.

"I know what you're thinking." Taneli says, a set to his shoulders as if preparing himself for the worst. Vayne hides the smirk - few people in the world who might say that and even fewer who have a chance at being accurate.

"Enlighten me?"

"I'm the only one who works with those stones, you should know that. No one else, just me. The magicite's good, all solid. I check it myself, even source it when I can. I don't put in a crystal anywhere in this city that won't hold, and I don't sell them."

It's illegal to fabricate crystals, to manufacture them without a license. Highly illegal - but that's all worries over compressed scrapstone or cheap spellcraft and of course, not what Vayne is thinking at all.

"How many repairs have you made like that in the city?"

Taneli grimaces. "I can show you. I don't have a list written up, but I know them all. It's… there's a lot." His eyes flash, he's tense with that anger Vayne saw before. "It's not like you gave us a choice! We could hardly buy food, let alone crystals, and they wouldn't replace anything no matter how we asked - I did what I had to do to survive. To make sure _your city_ survived, Lord Consul."

"Will you show me how?"

Vayne watches the mechanic try to figure it out, how letting the Lord Consul see what he's already confessed to can make anything worse. A long moment passes, until finally Taneli gives up trying to puzzle it out, stepping in between the narrow isles in the back of the shop and gesturing for Vayne to follow.

"It was a bit less of a production when I had the other hand," he says, and as he steps up to the low bench Vayne hears the crunch of magicite fragments beneath his boots, watching him position a large, rough block of it in a carefully padded vise and pick up a chiseled blade.

Maybe they did it this way in ages past, but Vayne's never seen anyone facet a gem like this. Taneli whistles his way slowly up the scale until the magicite sings in response, and with a few deft motions he's sliced away great portions of the surrounding stone, listening to the way the stone echoes back, letting the glow of it tell him exactly where and how to strike.

It's ice magicite, Vayne can feel the temperature in the room falling with every cut he makes. The initial work takes an impressively short amount of time, and again Taneli compensates with practiced ease for his missing limb, lifting a chisel poised in a much tinier vise, attached to a swing arm above the now-revealed crystal. He positions the delicate tool with swift certainty, chipping away smaller fragments of magicite, whistling all the while until the facets of the crystal are plain to see. Taneli lifts it from the vise and hands it over, obviously proud of himself even when he knows he ought not to be.

"I'd polish it up, of course, but that's more or less how it's done."

"Who taught you how?"

Taneli glances up at that, not the question he's expecting, as if Vayne gives a damn for the finer points of magicite regulation.

"No one," the mechanic says. "I mean, I've had an apprenticeship like anyone but… I don't know how I know. It just makes sense, is all."

Which is more or less the answer Vayne had received when he'd asked the question at Draklor.

"Do you fly?"

A huff of laughter, and Taneli lifts what's left of his missing limb. "I've got an eight pound weight advantage. Hell yes, I fly."

Vayne wonders how he deals with the missing limb at a hundred-fifty miles an hour, but assumes he likely found the answer to that before everything else he did in a day. The build teams at Draklor would have to be heads in jars before they'd think of giving up on the sky - and even then, he's sure they'd find a way.

"Why haven't you gone to Rozarria? Or Bhujerba?"

It's not a good thing to say. Taneli steps away from the bench as if from a blazing fire, and there's pain there and hate there and it's certainly meant for him.

"No one's got much use for a one-armed shipwright, even if I can whistle a pretty tune. Rabanastre's my home, and they need me. I think I've fixed half the city by now, when no one's looking. I would have fixed that pump too, sooner or later." He glares, daring Vayne to do his worst. "So, what happens now? Is it the stocks, or do I get to see Nalbina again?"

"If I thought you could teach that, I'd ship you back to Archades tomorrow. As it is, you're doing good work here, right where I need good work done. I will have to do something about the magicite supply to the city's artificers, though. Impressive though it may be, I'm sure you have better things to do than cut crystal."

Taneli stares. Still trying to figure him out, still coming up with nothing he can use. "It's all right if I don't believe you right away?"

"Perfectly understandable." Vayne says, handing the ice crystal back to him. The room's cool enough now that he can see his breath in the air. Amazing.

"It's true what you said, though," Taneli says. "You really don't conscript?"

"Are you sure that's what you want to hear?" Vayne says. "It means more of our soldiers on your streets."

"Better than us fighting and dying in your stead," the mechanic snaps. "If it's not the Empire demanding concessions, it's Rozarria trying to come in through the back door." Vayne raises an eyebrow, but the mechanic's glare is a clear reply, that he had no right to pretend Rozarria's interest is any kind of revelation. "Dalmasca doesn't bow, not to your empire or any other, and we're not about to go the way Nabudis did for the sake of your war!"

"Where did you serve?" Vayne asks, because he's been curious all this time and since the man's already angry it seems as good a time as any to find out. He hasn't heard it phrased exactly like that before, with Nabudis as the unknowing sacrifice placed on the altar by warring empires, but for all he knows it's true, and certainly the sort of thing to put the fear into its sister kingdom. Taneli is surprised by the question, and it seems to puncture his anger somewhat, though he answers with one of his own.

"It's your ship, isn't it. The _Ifrit_?"

"I command the Eighth Fleet, yes."

"I was a combat engineer aboard the _Aurai_, at Nalbina. We met the First Fleet there - did some damage while we were aloft, gave as good as we got." He glances up, to see if Vayne reacts to that - still trying to provoke, or perhaps just the pride of a soldier, refusing to deny his place in the fight. "Hell of a battle. I was sure I wasn't going to see the other side of it. Still not sure which one of your ships hit us. Just a glancing blow, or we all would have been ash, but it was enough to sink the ship. By the time they got me out of the wreckage, it was too late for the arm."

Taneli flexes his remaining hand, crushing it into a fist before spreading his fingers wide once more. He's weighing his next words carefully, not quite sure if it's worth the risk to speak, though Vayne can't imagine there's anything else the man can say to try and provoke him. A surprise then, when he does nothing of the kind.

"I would have gladly died, to keep Dalmasca free. I wasn't afraid of dying, and I'm sure as hell not afraid of the Empire." Taneli looks up, meeting Vayne's gaze to prove to the both of them that it's true. "But… we were overrun, almost from the beginning. A bottleneck on the ground doesn't mean much if the sky's clear, and they should have known it before we went in. You could see it - the paling wasn't going to hold, and Rasler didn't withdraw. Everyone knows he had his chance - he could have pulled back. I'm loyal to Dalmasca, to my last breath - but Rasler of Nabradia was too proud. He should have quit the field instead of dying on it. No one wants to admit to it, not now that he's gone - but that doesn't mean it's not true."

Now there's an interesting concession, that all of Dalmasca might not have been as eager to follow its sister-state into war, and that Rasler - Rasler of Nabradia, Vayne had noted the distinction - had been quick to rally his young wife's armies to a battle his own had so recently lost. He couldn't help but wonder what King Raminas had counseled, especially in light of all that had followed.

He'd thought it a foregone conclusion, that should Ashelia stand up to be formally recognized her people would yet rally, would throw themselves at the Empire to the last man - but perhaps that was not entirely so. Maybe the city mourned its lost princess so deeply because it meant they could honor her without having to take up her banner as their own.

"You know," Taneli says, "you're not the first surprise Ktjn's brought to my door. I've never had her bring me trouble, though, until today… but maybe she was right to do it. Maybe… well, I thought you'd have shipped me to the dungeons twice over by now."

Vayne smiles. "I prefer mutually beneficial agreements when I can get them. Otherwise, someone tries to kill me and I have to try and remember why and it's the damnedest waste of my time."

The mechanic laughs a little at that, while he tries to figure out if Vayne is joking.

"I would like for you to meet with one of Draklor's finest, if you'd consider it." Vayne says. "He'll be arriving shortly, and I think he'd be interested in speaking with you, finding out how the city works, and watching you cut down some more magicite. The only problem then will be how to keep him from running off back home with you when you're done."

"You think I…? What?" Unlikely that he means to glance down at his missing limb, but Taneli does, just for the briefest moment. "I really don't see what use I'd be to anyone there, Lord Consul."

"I have a feeling I could put you on the next flight and you'd have your own build team in a sixmonth. In the future, yes, I would very much like for you to see the lab in person - but for now, I'd like you here as an advisor on projects for the city. I'm going to bring in some of the lab's mechanics soon, and they'll need someone to advise them on what they ought to do. Otherwise, I promise you they'll get inventive and soon the whole city will be floating six feet above the ground with the water running backwards."

It's funny how quickly confidence can fade in the face of simple recognition, Taneli's irritation at being so long overlooked and ignored suddenly replaced with nervousness. It's amazing how frightened people can get when they're offered what they've always wanted.

"You want me to… I'm not, I mean, I just… I would need to think about this."

"Absolutely," Vayne says, and hands him the ledger, a half-dozen pages of his countrymen's requests. "You can ponder it over in our meeting with the Marshalls tomorrow. I'll send a man by to escort you. If you're at all worried about not fitting in, I can assure you they won't want you there - but they'll loathe me considerably more. The unimaginable tedium should take care of any lingering doubts about your usefulness."

He's being too informal by half, seeing the shipwright as his job and not where he's from - but half of Archades already thinks he's as mad as Cid is, surely Rabanastre will come to believe it too whether he tries or not. Taneli's not saying no, not saying much of anything - gods, sometimes Vayne thinks he keeps living just to see that look, that disbelieving surprise. Anything to avoid living up to expectations.

The mechanic finally shakes his head. "But you don't know me."

"I believe I've seen enough."

"I don't… but you know…" He sounds absolutely baffled. "I don't even _like_ you, Lord Consul."

Vayne laughs, because that much honesty more than deserves it. "Fortunately, that has never had a thing to do with business."

* * *

"Lord Consul!"

Loren is the one to run him down at last, catching him at a cross-street quite close to the palace gates. His freshly-minted Chief Advisor slows to a brisk walk as he approaches, brushing dust off his jacket trying to look as if he hadn't been sprinting around town searching for its thoroughly irresponsible head of state. Vayne takes some satisfaction that Loren is alone as well, that he is not the only one who does not think Rabanastre so dangerous, and stops so that the other man might catch his breath before moving onward.

"Good afternoon, Loren. Is everything all right?"

"Sir. Yes, sir. We didn't… that is," he glances around Vayne, to where the soldiers stand, and seems at least slightly relived at the sight of the guard. Loren looks disheveled enough that Vayne doesn't bother to correct the assumption. "You didn't leave word where you had gone, sir, and some hours have passed since then. There were… concerns."

Which means the time Loren hadn't used in searching had been spent composing his explanation to the Emperor for when they finally found the Lord Consul's body. Surely there must be an official royal template out there somewhere, to speed that up a bit.

"I do apologize." Which doesn't at all preclude Vayne from doing it again, but let that be a surprise for another day. "I wished to see a bit of the city for myself and fell in with an interesting crowd. It was well worth the time of speaking with them. I do regret if I caused any undue alarm."

"I wouldn't buy what he's selling at discount," a familiar voice calls out as they reach the edge of the palace grounds, Cid with a sheaf of papers in his hand, not bothering to look up at his approach.

"I hope that isn't classified." Vayne chides back, and Cid makes a face.

"What, you don't trust your guard? Besides," he slaps the stack against his other hand, "if Rozarria could rebalance this mess for me I'd be tempted to let them have the lot."

Vayne keeps walking, and the doctor steps in beside them, and they might as well be back in Archades if not for Loren keeping pace on his other side, curiosity momentarily overcoming his politeness.

"I thought you'd sorted all that out ages ago," Vayne says.

"They're all too damn smart for their own good." Cid complains, but there's no actual disappointment in his tone. "We just finished calibrating for the maximum outputs, and five minutes before I ship out they throw a new set of figures at me. Fifteen and a half percent increase in power. _Fifteen and a half_. It's brilliant - but it also throws off everything. A dreadnought can bear the extra plating it'll take to hold the strain, but anything less? A light cruiser won't get off the ground with that much added weight, and even then I'm not sure the engine won't just tear the damn thing to pieces, to say nothing of trying to slow it down if we ever dare bring it to full speed."

A perpetual battle in the skies, always the demand for more power, more guns, more speed without disrupting the balance a ship needs to stay in the sky. How to make the strongest, fastest and most devastating warship without overweighting the stones. The moogles wrote the basic principles, a constant for centuries, but once again Nethicite is turning all the old laws on their heads. It's been a constant game of innovation and adaptation, learning as they go. Cid might complain, but Vayne has never seen him more well-contented.

"So I'll expect the answer by dinner," he says, and Cid snorts. Vayne pulls a small crystal from his pocket, handing it over. "When you have a moment."

Cid takes it, lifts it to the sun briefly before pulling out a jeweler's loupe, one of his ever-present tools. He studies the gem in a contemplative silence.

"Nice lines on it. Obviously not high-grade material to start, but it's an inventive choice of faceting. Whoever this is, they've nearly doubled the power in cutting it like this. Rozarrian import?

"It was cut here in the city. By hand."

Cid looks up at him, impressed but perhaps not so surprised. Vayne tends to deal in impossibilities. "I'd like to see that."

"I told him to drop by. One of the local shipwrights. They're all being utterly wasted here. Between the Marshals and the Lord Regent they've grounded every bike in the city, and half of them can't even work as mechanics on what needs to be repaired." He can see this is all little surprise to Loren, and Vayne wonders what work the man's been letting slip through on the side, what else he knows of in Rabanastre that he might convinced to share.

"So you'll have it all fixed by dinner, then." Cid says, and looks at the gem for another moment with an appreciative eye before tucking it away for later study. "How is your brother enjoying the palace?"

"What?"

"Well, he's not with you now, so I assumed…" Cid trails off at Vayne's stare, and pulls another one of his tools - a collapsable spyglass - handing it over and pointing back the way they'd come, out across the city and past the Aerodrome to where a ship hangs in the distance.

"His ship came in with the _Tyche_." Which means several annoying meetings Vayne's going to dodge for as long as he can, but he's not thinking about that now. Really, he doesn't need to look, Cid knows better than anyone what ships are in the skies, especially one he put there nearly single-handed, and there it is, trailing a bit behind the _Tyche_ just past the edge of the city - the _Balius_.

Larsa's ship, here in Rabanastre.

"Loren."

"Yes, Lord Consul?"

He keeps his voice steady, always. Affected boredom is always the right default.

"Is my brother in the palace?"

"No, sir. We've had no word…"

"Have men sent to the Aerodrome, if he is in need of an escort. Clear anything I have scheduled for the rest of the day, and turn away anyone seeking an audience. Did we mark all the exits we've discovered beneath the palace?"

"Not quite all, sir."

"I want men stationed in pairs at all of them, and on every entrance into the palace as well, not just those at the outer walls. I will need a few messengers, if there has been no word sent from the _Tyche_. I would like to locate my brother as soon as possible."

"Of course, Lord Consul."

If Loren is at all surprised by the sudden flurry of orders, there is not much to be said about it. He bows and retreats toward the main doors, and then they are alone, though Vayne cuts through the gardens toward the closest entrance he can think of, the silence around them suddenly far more oppressive and he can't feel the heat at all.

It would take so little. One single angry, lucky fool. It wouldn't even need to be an attack against him, there's no hiding what his brother is. Larsa is every inch the noble Imperial, worth making an example of even if they'd never heard his name, and it's barely been a day, less that if he counts back from the moment they struck and…

"So _now_ you care for the danger." Cid says, pushing to keep up. "Eleven whole hours, was it, before they tried to take your head off? Even for you that must be some kind of record."

"Only outside of the Empire," Vayne says, still distracted, cursing himself for a fool. It's ridiculous to think he has control of this, of anything. All of it a delusion of ego, pretending that a haughty attitude is somehow a defense against the whims of circumstance. "The rebellion is of little consequence. We push back one attack from Rozarria, and all Dalmasca will think the better of our presence here."

It's difficult not to start acting the fool, to bark out more orders, though after the fete the palace is already on high alert. He takes a careful breath, forcing his steps to slow so that the doctor can catch up. Only then does Vayne notice his heart is pounding. At least he does not have to waste the effort trying to hide it anymore.

"No one on the Tyche is about to risk your brother's safety, and Gabranth is always with him," Cid says with logical certainty. "Who would ever dare to challenge _that,_ let alone hope to survive it?"

"I can't imagine what possessed him to come here now." Vayne says, and the few moments it takes to reach the palace feel like ages. He resents the time it takes even to push the door open.

"Oh, it's unforgivably reckless," Cid says agreeably. "One can only imagine where he acquired the habit. I'm amazed you didn't give them all weapons first, just to make it a proper challenge."

The doctor is goading him on purpose. Trying to take his attention off all the vague horrors his mind is only too happy to set out before him. It's funny, it ought not to work, Vayne should know better than to feel reassured, and yet…

"If I shut myself away, they'll think they actually accomplished something. Fear _is_ the weapon, Cid. If it's to be my hesitation or my blood, they're free to paint the walls with it. But I'm not about to-"

Vayne expects no one to be in the hall, at most perhaps a maid or a soldier on their rounds. So the girl is a bit of a surprise, though she seems equally startled at the sight of him.

The dress is Archadian, a simple affair in gold and pale blue, and a good choice for a Dalmascan girl, if he can venture such a guess from her pale hair and tan skin and how truly and utterly petrified she is at the sight of him. Vayne knows exactly what he is capable of, and it _still_ seems a bit too much fear, the sort of horror befitting an Esper or a seven-hour Senate deliberation. He does his best to gentle his amusement into his most mannered smile.

"Hello, there. I don't believe I've had the honor."

She faints very well for a Dalmascan, the tiniest little chirp of sound and just like that, down she goes. Vayne is grateful for the reflexes and practice of many social gatherings where collapsing on a man is as likely as punctuation at the end of a sentence. Those girls, however, were just as quick to come to their senses, seizing the advantage of close quarters as an opportunity for flirtation or to be disappointed at their aim, discovering the man they'd sought was not the one to catch them. Vayne has been on the receiving end of both kinds. It's much easier to deal with the latter.

"Miss? Are you all right?"

No answer. The girl is a dead weight in his arms.

Cid looks at him in puzzlement. "What did you do that for?"

"You could be helpful or get me a chair or _something_."

Fortunately there is a sitting room only a few steps down the hall, and he is rather grateful the girl chose a gown that makes her easy to carry, though even when she's settled carefully on the couch she does not stir. Vayne studies her for a moment, quietly.

"I am trying to imagine a way in which this is not my brother's doing."

"It certainly has that Solidor air of utter inexplicability." Cid says dryly.

"Stay with her, I'll be back shortly."

He leaves the room, the doctor's final remarks following him out.

"Royal insurrections. Gangs of rogue shipwrights. Enigmatic, fainting women. It's like I never left home."


	34. the law of probability 10

The odd scratching noise doesn't wake her, it's too quiet for that. It is unfamiliar, though, and doesn't make sense, and so Penelo opens her eyes before she can think the better of it. She doesn't recognize the fabric under her cheek or the pattern in the tile she's gazing at or even _why_ she doesn't know where she is.

The sound stops as she sits up, replaced by the rustling of the skirts she's wearing, carefully laid out around her to keep from wrinkling and Penelo raises a hand to her hair, still so carefully bound up, and that's when she remembers everything.

"Ah, welcome back."

The cheerful voice still startles her, a man perched at the other end of the sofa she'd been laid upon. Penelo has a vague, dim recollection of him, that he'd been standing with the Lord Consul when she - when… oh gods.

"Are you feeling better?" He says politely, even with his gaze fixed to a pile of papers in his other hand. "They've brought by refreshments, if it helps."

The glass on the table is cold, condensation bleeding through her glove when she lifts it. It's a testament to how rattled she is that Penelo doesn't realize it's champagne, not water, until she's on her second swallow and her drink is more than half-empty. At least it's cold, and sharp, and if it dulls the edge of her nervousness… Penelo's not even sure if that's a good idea or not, or if it even matters. Maybe the Lord Consul will believe her, that she's nobody from nowhere and not worth his time. Maybe he won't care enough to ask. The thought of coming up with some story - any story, no matter how harmless - makes her mouth dry up along with every word she might speak. The last thing Penelo wants to do is try to lie to Vayne Solidor.

The scratching that she'd heard is the man's pen moving in odd, furious stops and starts across the page. It isn't until he shifts his glasses back up on his nose and glances up at her that Penelo realizes she's been leaning forward to watch. The words on the page are practically illegible, mixed in with diagrams that make no more immediate sense.

"Never be good at anything, that's my advice." He shakes his head. "First they call you a visionary, and then you spend the rest of your time signing off on everyone else's paperwork, and making thirteen alterations a day to the safety protocols, and making sure they all sign off on those. My one rule for success is to avoid it at all costs."

"Um, sure." Penelo says, because at the moment it seems rather a manageable order, and the man looks up, blinking as if truly seeing her for the first time, and smiles. It lights him up, and Penelo catches a glimpse of a much younger man behind what now seems only a facade of age and respectability. It's impossible not to smile back.

"Forgive me, my manners are nonexistent. They usually know better than to let me out to menace the countryside." He bows, or as close as he can get while sitting down. "Doctor Cidolfus Bunansa, at your service. Or Cid, to save us some time."

"Penelo. My name is Penelo." Well that's at least one whole sentence, and her voice isn't even shaking. The man doesn't seem to notice her hesitance, still mostly distracted by his notes even though he's trying to be attentive. It's oddly charming, in a way.

"I don't suppose you might hold this for me?"

"Of course," Penelo says, which is how she comes to be carrying a large sheaf of papers and a spare pen and eventually an open ledger of some kind as Cid flicks his way through an abacus, making notations in the book she's holding when he's not muttering under his breath, although sometimes he does both at once. If he is in league with the Lord Consul, then he's a dangerous person and she ought to be frightened, but he just… he doesn't look like a man who wants to do her harm.

He reminds her mostly of one of the older men who play bocce in the city courtyards, trading friendly insults with each other all day long and never forgetting to greet her when she runs by. He isn't threatening her, or interrogating her. If anything, the Doctor seems on the verge of forgetting she is here at all, flipping through the pages of the book she's holding as Penelo catches glimpses of notations and sketches - sometimes upside down, but other times the drawings are faced toward her, or stretched lengthwise across the page. The most impressive of these includes one particularly detailed sketch of an airship, half of it detailed in a cross-section, to reveal the systems at work beneath. Penelo tips her head, trying for a better look.

"I do apologize, this is my first visit to Rabanastre," he says, when a drop of sweat suddenly splashes against the page, "at what time ought I expect the sun to simply crash into the city?"

The Archadian dress is a bit warmer than what she's used to, but even in her own clothes this is the time of day Penelo usually spends hiding from the sun, perhaps balancing the books from the relative comfort of Migelo's largest cooler. Cid grins at her sympathetic smile, abandoning propriety in favor of using his glove as a makeshift handkerchief, wiping at his brow.

"I would ask how they manage to build around here, but I imagine it is easier when you can smelt bare-handed."

"The hottest work happens at night, and they'll push through until the dawn. No one does much now, in the middle of the day. It's the time for talking up new ideas." Penelo gestures to his drawing. "I think you have that part down quite well."

"What do you think?" Cid asks, proudly certain of the answer, and Penelo can't blame him. Little more than hazy lines on paper, and she can still imagine how it will look in the sky.

"It's beautiful. It reminds me a little of the _Balius_."

"It ought to, that ship's got the best of everything I had to give her."

"You… designed Lord Larsa's airship?"

Cid nods as if such things are commonplace, and though he still does not frighten her, now Penelo can be absolutely certain he is nothing like the old men in the courtyards.

He looks at her, curious. "Just how did you and he meet in Bhujerba?"

"I… um…" Penelo knows she's done nothing wrong and the truth still makes her sound guilty of everything. "I was… well, there was… I suppose first, there was a sky pirate. His name was Balthier."

"Balthier?" Cid says, and he seems unduly amused, though she can't imagine why. "Pray, do continue."

"Cid, a lady is not a writing desk."

Penelo doesn't jump at the sound of that voice, mostly because she is buried beneath paperwork, but at least that gives her something to hold onto and an excuse not to stand up and find a way to keep from falling over again as the Lord Consul steps into the room.

Gods, he wasn't the one who'd caught her, was he?

Cid makes a face, taking the book away from her, but Penelo can't think to move before Larsa is beside her, crouched down again as if she were in any way his equal. He notices her new dress, she can tell, but if it puzzles him he makes no mention of it.

"Are you all right? My brother said he'd startled you quite badly." Larsa frowns. "I understand that you were… leaving? I hope I might convince you to stay a while longer. I apologize for my rudeness, I did not intend to bring you home only to abandon you here for so long."

As strange and impossible as everything has been up until now, nothing quite captures the moment of having Larsa there beside her with the Lord Consul only a few steps beyond. The kindest boy she's ever met, and a man she fears more than anything else, the resemblance between them even more striking now that they're together.

"No, I… I'm all right, thank you. I was just… I thought I ought to…" Her hands flutter absurdly in front of her, not sure where to land, Penelo certain only that she looks ridiculous. "I didn't wish to intrude any further than I had."

A noble lady would have called for a carriage, and never considered sneaking out the back door. A noble lady would have likely done a lot of things, and she's likely betraying herself now in a thousand little ways. Even before she'd been an orphan in Lowtown, Penelo had no right to be here. All there is left to do is wait for Vayne to call her on it, and then there will be questions and more questions and she fights to keep from clenching her hands into fists. Whatever is coming, she must be brave.

"Well," the Lord Consul says, "as my brother has provided us with a guest to entertain and I've already put off working for most of the morning, I suppose there is only one sensible course of action."

* * *

It's all another kind of dance, politeness and propriety as regimented as any steps she's ever learned. Penelo might not be as skilled in these particulars as she is in a quadrille, but she knows enough to allow Larsa to help her to her feet, to smile and nod to the Lord Consul when he extends the invitation and tell him yes, of course, it would be her honor to stay for the midday meal. It doesn't matter if her heart is pounding, the fear making her dizzy and nearly breathless as they move from room to room. All that matters is that her steps are graceful and sure, and that when she passes a mirror the Penelo who looks back seems as if she belongs here. Archadian ladies are expected to be ornamental or invisible, all she has to do is smile vacantly and keep quiet and not think about anything beyond the boundaries of the table, and she might still make it out alive.

Lunch is served in a terrace on a private corner of the palace grounds, surrounded by tiled pools and green vines crawling up the trellises that arch high above the table, blocking out the worst of the sun. It's far more familiar to be on the other side of the a meal like this, pouring drinks for rich Archadians and listening to gossip while pretending she's invisible, waiting for the next task at hand. At home, Penelo's used to mending while she cooks, and cleaning while she eats. It's strange to have nothing to do with her hands. She's almost jealous of Cid, buried in his notes when he's not fanning himself with them. Servants dart to and from the table - more drinks, more champagne, and brightly-colored ices to start the meal, set in the shape of flowers, so delicate and lovely she doesn't know if she dares to ruin them by tasting.

The Doctor has no such reservations, Cid reaching absently for his own bowl with one hand, crunching the delicate sculptures to pieces with his spoon, never even looking up from his notes. She doesn't hide her dismay well enough, if the amused look on Vayne's face is anything to go by.

The Lord Consul is nearly always smiling, small and quiet, as if he finds the whole of the world to be slightly absurd. Penelo has no idea what to make of it.

"You have the soul of a poet, Cid, truly."

The Doctor waves his spoon in the air dismissively, not bothering to look up.

At least the Judge Magister is back, so when she's not being scared silly by the Lord Consul all she has to do is move her head a quarter of an inch to have him watching her from the other side of the room. Penelo can't help but notice him, her eyes flicking over at the slightest shifting of his armor, though of course no one else pays him the slightest attention.

"… and you were finally able to have them outbidding each other instead of bothering you. Nicely done, little brother."

Larsa and Vayne have been speaking of his time aboard the _Tyche_, of Archadian politics on such familiar terms that she cannot follow the conversation, and Penelo's rather grateful for it. The more time they spend on the business of their home, the less attention there is on Dalmasca, or on her. The Lord Consul still casts a curious glance in her direction, now and then, but Penelo has not quite met his gaze and hopes to keep it that way.

"It was not my intention." Larsa says, half-annoyed and half-chagrined. "All they truly wished to know of was the Nethicite. I did not think there were so many different ways to say 'I don't know.'" He frowns. "You said you did not expect a warm welcome, but these men…"

"Tibsen thinks I'm weak and the rest of them believe I'm incompetent. Away from home and therefore out of my depth." Vayne says it as if the thought is far more pleasing than praise. "Is there anything else I ought to hear of, concerning the Lord Consul's imminent failure?"

"It was difficult to get them to agree to much of anything," Larsa says, "but a common sentiment was that most of the city's problems have their origin in a place called Lowtown. A maze of makeshift housing for those displaced during the occupation. It was their belief that the rebels' stronghold lay within."

Penelo's breath catches, and she carefully sets down the glass she's holding, before it betrays the way her hand is trembling. It isn't true, of course. It couldn't be true. If the rebels had been in Lowtown, she'd have known all about it - Vaan would have known it, and been gone ages ago. She might protest - but she can't, or they'll ask how she knows, if they even believe her at all, or care.

Larsa would care, but he is not Lord Consul.

"I have heard of the place. An issue we will have to address at some point." Vayne's voice is as calm as ever, with no idea how he measures her life out with each idle word.

Larsa grins. "It sounds a bit like Old Archades, doesn't it?"

Penelo sees the look that passes between them, but she doesn't understand it, some private joke or reference that Larsa finds quite amusing, while Vayne obviously does not share the sentiment.

"You think I've ignored the fact that you're here against my wishes - not to mention those of the Crown - and have also hijacked an innocent girl into serving as your excuse."

"Kidnapped." Cid says.

Vayne raises an eyebrow. "Truly?"

The doctor nods. "Before she was hijacked. It seems she fell afoul of that notorious sky pirate Balthier."

He says it flippantly enough, but Penelo's stomach plummets through the floor, into the sands beneath the palace and just keeps going as Vayne looks to her and she sees the exact moment of his recognition.

"You were the girl in the palace, after the fete. You came for the boy who was sent to the dungeons."

Larsa's eyes go wide. "You sentenced him to _Nalbina_?"

"Well, there was that little matter of the attempt on my life." Vayne says dryly.

"Vaan would never do that! He wouldn't hurt anyone!"

The words come out of her in a rush, with every ounce of vehemence she can manage, even as Penelo knows it isn't entirely the truth. Maybe Vaan hadn't gone into the palace looking for blood, but he certainly wouldn't have been upset, had the Lord Consul not survived the night. It frightens her to know that she's not certain what he might have done, had it been his choice to make.

"Of course not." Vayne - impossibly - seems to agree with her. "Your friend is simply a young man with a sense of adventure and incredibly bad timing. Hardly the first. Balthier can be very convincing for a man raised by wolves. Or degenerates."

"Degenerate wolves." Cid mutters from the depths of his notes.

"I do wonder, though, if you have any idea what he was looking for in the palace vaults, and why?" Vayne asks.

"Nothing." Penelo says, trying not to feel angry, that once again she's here cleaning up Vaan's mess - except that it's better this way, she has much more experience with this part. "He wanted… he just wanted to take something, anything from the palace. It didn't matter what it was, just a stupid…" Penelo bites her lip, feeling the tightrope sway beneath her, truth and diplomacy forever at odds, uncertain how much she can afford to give away or if it even matters now. "Vaan lost his brother in the war, and he's been… drifting, since then. He doesn't know what he wants, or what he ought to do next. So he just _does_ these things, he doesn't _think_…"

"You don't agree?"

It shouldn't be her, here. It should be someone better, smarter, a true Dalmascan noble instead of her pathetic, slapdash imitation - but Penelo _is_ here now, and the Lord Consul has asked what seems to be an honest question, attempting to measure the mood of his new home. It's her obligation, isn't it, for Rabanastre, for everyone she knows, to try and find some common ground? The table is cool under her hand, and steady when nothing else is, and her gloves hide the white-knuckled grip on her spoon.

"He didn't tell me what he was going to do, or I never would have let him go." Penelo says. "It's been two years for those of us in the city, not knowing what might happen next, or when… and now… really, we're not so different, are we? We were all the same Empire once, under Raithwall's banner." She's cribbing badly from some of the drunker philosophies she's overheard while taking inventory, Migelo and the other merchants musing on the greater meaning of all that's happened. Trust a trader to make the best of things, even if that means spinning it from whole cloth. "We're merchants here in Rabanastre. Our city is built on new arrivals, on the fresh and the different. We couldn't survive otherwise. Everything changes, we know that. It's a part of our lives."

_I can't watch anyone else die._ Now there's the real truth, beneath all her silly equivocating. Penelo can't see more blood in the streets, not Vaan's or Migelo's - not the Lord Consul, even if that means sacrificing Dalmasca's freedom forever. It makes her the worst kind of traitor, but that doesn't make it any less true.

"The past is the past. We can't forget it, or those that were lost - but we have to go on."

Does it sound good, or pathetic? Penelo wonders if the Lord Consul can hear between the lines, everything she couldn't say - _what if you're lying, what hope do we have then?_ and _what happens to Vaan now, if he returns to Rabanastre?_ but if he does there's no sign of it as he lifts his glass, and Penelo realizes she has sort of given a toast.

"Well said - to the future."

* * *

What's left of the melted ices are hurried away, and from the corner of her eye Penelo catches a green glimmer from where the servants are standing, just past the edge of the wall. Which of them, she wonders, is trustworthy enough to cast that spell, checking for poison on every dish that passes?

Until today, Penelo's most exceptional adventure had been a single trip to Balfonheim, and it had only been wondrous by her provincial standards, seeing the ships and the ocean at her father's side in the middle of the great unknown. At the time she'd thought it would be only the first of so many amazing journeys, but it had quickly become a memory Penelo clung to, desperately. A reminder that things had been different, that there was a world out there even if she couldn't imagine how she might ever see it again.

Now here she is, dining with royalty, with all she'd had in Balfonheim is arrayed before her, a dainty plate of mussels and one of clams and a tray of fresh oysters, raw in the shell. It's been years, but she remembers exactly the moment her father had first presented them to her. He'd been so delighted, nothing like them to be found in Rabanastre, at least not that they could afford, and like no food she'd ever seen. She'd been dubious, but not willing to hurt her father's feelings, and oh, the taste of them - sour-salty, crisp and clean and just like the sea, like nothing else.

It's difficult not to slip a hand free from her glove, to touch the rough shell, but even without that sensation it's like stepping right back into that memory, like she's young again and free - and so much for thinking it's safe, if she keeps her thoughts on the meal.

Larsa is much more fond of the clams, while the Lord Consul is eating nothing but oysters himself. The Doctor is the only one who seems to be avoiding the seafood entirely, poking at something brown and breaded she doesn't recognize, trying to cut it with a fork while still studying his notes. He looks up after the fifth or sixth attempt to find her watching. Penelo is not so afraid to meet his eyes, or to give his food a curious stare.

"Scotch egg." He says, glancing pointedly away when she picks up another oyster.

"Typical Archadian palate," Vayne says, earning him another dismissive wave from Cid's side of the table. It's possible not to jump out of her skin every time she finds he's watching because it's clear the Lord Consul is _always_ watching. Maybe it isn't anything she's done or that he suspects her of - maybe this is nothing more than the same curiosity that Larsa shares, sharpened by the obligations of his authority.

He certainly doesn't act like she's come to expect from Archadian nobles, those men and women who are distracted at best and indifferently cruel at worst. It would be more offensive if they treated each other with any more kindness - but just look at Rhiale and her sister. The Baron likely did not spend an extra moment with them when he wasn't showing them off. He did not even treat them as guests, merely property. If she had stayed with Larsa in that meeting, Penelo knew very well what she could expect - a pile of men trying to shout over one another, puffed up with importance and aware of nothing beyond the scope of their immediate concerns.

The Lord Consul listens. He smiles at his servants, even murmuring his thanks now and then, as if they're actual people. He is attentive when his brother speaks, and it is easy to see the affection between them, why Larsa thinks so highly of his brother. He makes fun of Cid and expects the Doctor to return his taunting with interest - they bicker like the oldest and best of friends.

Vayne Solidor has the kind of power the rest of those men spend all their time fighting for, and he knows it. Penelo's rather sure he knows _she_ knows it, and yet he has asked nothing more of her, even after discovering her connection to Vaan. He doesn't even seem all that concerned, even the idea of his assassination only a passing curiosity. He is nothing like she expected, and she has no idea what he is instead, or what it means that she's more and more certain that boring him is no more a safe prospect than simply speaking her mind.

The second course arrives, and while Larsa receives a rather intricate but tame-looking salad, she and Vayne have been presented with… well, she has had lobster before, on that same trip with her father, but not quite so fresh that it is still twitching when it hits the table. Cid lets out a long-suffering sigh, his glasses dropping to the end of their chain, preferring a less-than-clear view of what's to come.

"You don't have to eat that." Larsa says, giving Vayne an exasperated look that is returned with equanimity.

Is he making fun of her? Is this some sort of challenge, and he's expecting her to lose her nerve? Maybe she ought to, but Penelo's not about to quail at the sight of a few twitching legs, although it would help if she could be sure which bit of silverware she's supposed to use, far more familiar with selling, packing and shipping such finery.

"Left of the dinner fork." Larsa murmurs, trying not to smile.

"… of course," Penelo says just as softly, trying not to smile back. Neither of them succeed very well.

The lobster is amazing, sweet and tender like nothing she's ever tasted. It doesn't escape her notice that the Doctor's new plate is somewhat similar to his old one - exactly similar, really. It doesn't escape Vayne's notice, either.

"Just what do you have there?"

"Eat your live bait and leave me be." Cid mutters, but when Vayne continues to stare he finally relents, slicing a precise cross-section through his course to reveal… two Scotch eggs, instead of one. The Lord Consul sighs, gesturing to one of the servants.

"Take this away, and no more eggs for him. Imperial decree."

"Tyrant." Cid mutters, obviously considering the benefits of spearing one of Larsa's tomatoes and launching a bombardment. He looks to her, and straightens his shoulders a bit, regally.

"There's nothing at all wrong with an Archadian palate."

"Except for the food part."

Cid makes a face. "I like a good rare steak."

"That hardly signifies." Vayne says. "Everyone likes a good rare steak. If you liked a well-done steak I'd have you exiled."

The next course moves a little closer to home, turtle meat, but mixed with a blend of spices she's not familiar with - Rozarrian, perhaps? It's just as delicious as the last. The Lord Consul's plates always match hers, and she finally wonders if he isn't teasing or testing her, only enjoying a guest with tastes as adventurous as his own. Penelo never believed she was particularly daring, but there won't be a second chance at a meal like this, and she'd be a fool to pass it up.

The Doctor does not think so highly of the opportunity - his next dish is an alarming shade of off-white lumps buried beneath an equally dismal shade of gray. Vayne watches him with a sort of resigned dismay.

"You won't touch the spices, but you'll fall on the… whatever that is like a starving man. What _is_ that? Is that a spleen?"

Cid smirks proudly. "This is the spleen that built an Empire."

"Do stop waving that thing around. There is a lady present."

Penelo giggles, she can't help it, surprised at herself and surprised that no one seems upset with her for it. She is startled most of all by the realization of how pleasant this all is, that if she doesn't think about exactly what's happening, she's actually enjoying herself. The food is delicious and beautiful and strange, tiny plates filled with flavors she's never imagined, though even Vayne has to pause when a servant staggers to the table with a sea creature the size of a bowling ball, the colorful shell covered with spikes and seemingly impenetrable.

"Well, this looks ill-advised."

Cid is suggesting high explosives by the time they discover a piece of the shell has been carefully detached, the cool, sweet meat carefully spiced, chilled and waiting inside.  
The chef is Archadian, obviously, and so Penelo's not expecting what comes next: Cid with another beige-on-beige triumph, Vayne with a rather normal-looking piece of game bird and Larsa with one to match - but the servant winks as he sets a plate down in front of her, and she knows it by smell even before he pulls the lid away, glistening _dolmas_ all lined up in a row.

Larsa looks curious, and Penelo pushes the plate a bit in his direction, to give him a better view.

"Grape leaves. Rice. Meat and spices. It's nothing special."

A few other ingredients, depending on who made them, though there'd been less options as the war dragged on. The last time Penelo can remember making them as they ought to be made had been as part of the celebration dinner, before her brothers had left for the border. Before there had even been a war at all and it had only seemed part of some grand adventure and her mother had worried while her older brother laughed and ate most of her share when she wasn't looking. Penelo had been furious, and told him she wouldn't write, that she'd be glad when he was gone. If only she'd known, if only… but really, what could have changed? What could any of them have done differently, against the power of the Empire?

"Penelo?"

Larsa's not as frightening as his brother, but no less perceptive, and even keeping her thoughts to the table isn't working now. She manages a smile, it's easy to smile at Larsa, and who could ever have imagined an Archadian like him?

"I haven't had these in a long time, is all." Penelo takes one, and offers him the plate. Larsa accepts, and she turns to Vayne who accepts and then points across the table. It takes a moment for Cid to realize he's being cornered, and he blinks at her, obviously still lost in the middle of some complex equation.

"Ah… thank you, but…"

"Doctor." Vayne says, amusement beneath a thin veneer of sobriety. "You'll hurt the feelings of our guest."

Cid glares. "This is why nobody likes you."

Vayne is unmoved. "It might even cause a diplomatic incident."

The Doctor seems about a breath away from several such incidents himself, but he turns to Penelo with a gracious smile, and almost doesn't flinch when the smallest of the _dolmas_ hits his plate. Larsa is already halfway through his own, and Penelo takes a bite of one, quietly pleased to discover that they are nowhere near as good as the ones she used to make. To his credit, Cid does take a forkful without flinching, and Penelo watches him chew with trepidation slowly shifting into relief.

"You see," Vayne says, "you can barely taste the eyeballs."

Larsa coughs out a laugh while Penelo hides a smile behind her hand and the rest of Cid's _dolma_ very nearly goes airborne. She is about to suggest a few other, blander dishes he might want to try, and which spices to avoid entirely when a chirp echoes out, and then a louder warble in the distance, the call-and-response of a pair of chocobos on the palace grounds beyond the wall. It sounds more than a little disgruntled, at best. Larsa glances in the direction of the commotion, and then to his brother.

"We've been having trouble keeping them stabled since the airships swept through." Vayne sighs. "No more pleased with me than anyone else has been. If I can't get rid of you, perhaps you can think of some way to calm them down."

Larsa seems to have several ideas - Penelo can all but see the plans coming together behind his eyes.

"It reminds me, I saw a rather large flock on the dunes as we approached the city." Larsa looks to her. "I think they must have been wild birds, but I've never seen the like - quite narrow-bodied and very fast. A strange, pale gold, nearly white at the tips of their primaries?"

Penelo can imagine the moment easily enough, Larsa leaning over the railing with a looking glass fixed to the ground and the Judge Magister's hand on his coat to keep him from going right over the side. She wonders if he was able to order the ship to circle around for a second look.

"King Raithwall's own birds," she says, knowing the sort of reaction that will bring, nearly laughing at his instant delight.

"Truly?"

"The descendants of those chocobos set free after his death, if you believe the legends. It is said they refused to follow any other master. The flocks live amidst the desert cliffs and Jagd sands. They're difficult to find and nearly impossible to catch."

"I had heard the tribes have their own flocks of birds as well…" Larsa says wistfully. "On the _Tyche_, they said they have had little luck trading beyond the city walls. It does not agree with them to deal with Archadians."

"It's not you." Penelo says. "Not Archadia, I mean. It doesn't agree with them to deal with anyone. City folk aren't plains people either, and they're happy to let us know it."  
The thought hits her then, hard enough to knock every other one out of her head - this is her chance to repay Larsa for all he's done, to square any semblance of a debt between them. Except there's no way to do it without giving herself away completely, if there's anything the Lord Consul hasn't figured out. It's her mother's voice in her head, scolding her for being a showoff, for always having to be right - but being brave and keeping her head down has only gotten her more of the same - nothing. And it will make Larsa smile, and she wants to see Larsa smile.

Oh, she's an idiot, that's for sure.

"I can get you one. An egg, from one of Raithwall's birds. It's rare, but now and then they do find one. If you want it, it's yours."

There it is, the smile she'd been hoping for - and it is worth it, even if Larsa looks a little uncertain. "I would not wish to cause you trouble."

Penelo shakes her head. "It's not all that difficult. You just pick a tribe at random. Send them gifts and cut deals in their favor without asking for anything in return. It costs a bit up front, but before long the other tribes will send their men to you, annoyed about being left out, promising they can do one better. It's more about pride than money, at that point." All to be done again with each new trade, but it means she doesn't have to seek out the trader that has what she needs - just prove that she's ready for business, make a few careful inquiries, and an egg will show up sooner or later.

Larsa looks like he's already trying to decide on a name - and the Lord Consul… well, of course he's looking at her. He can probably see exactly how bad she knew this decision would be.

"Are all Dalmascans so skilled in trade?"

"A few more than most, perhaps." Except he's not asking about all of them, just the one he's looking at, and why bother thinking she can hide anymore? "My father made a good life for us, and he taught me much of what he knew."

Penelo has a few great stories, of clever deals he'd managed to make, though the spoils are likely to be less impressive in her current company.

"So, you are a merchant's daughter?"

It's the first time Penelo meets his gaze willingly, head high and jaw set. No matter what, she absolutely refuses to feel shame for her father, but Vayne only looks curious, not at all disapproving.

"We are merchants too, or were once." Larsa says, one hand against the twin serpents at his throat. "Our House crest honors an ancient god of trade, from even before the foundation of Bur-Omisace."

"The patron deity of liars, thieves and businessmen." Vayne says. "So, in your opinion, as a woman in trade - is there anything I ought to try to shamelessly curry favor with the people of Rabanastre?"

"I'm not… I don't think I'm the one to ask, Lord Consul."

"I do." The warning is gentle, but there. He will not allow her to play at ignorance. "When I gave that speech, I imagine you were thinking 'if this idiot knew half of what I did, we might actually have a chance to make things better."

"I didn't think you were an idiot, Lord Consul." Many, many other things perhaps - but never a fool.

"Diplomatic as well as beautiful." Now Vayne is surely teasing her, and Penelo completely forgets to be proper, blurting out the first thing that comes to mind.

"Coffee," she says, feeling the smallest hint of smug triumph at his look of surprise. "Archadia places heavy tariffs on any goods coming through from Rozarria, too heavy for most citizens to bear. It was a simple luxury for many before the war, and we miss it dearly now."

"You don't have _coffee_?" Cid says, in the same tone of voice as if Penelo had said they didn't have air, or legs. "And it took you this long to revolt?"

"Thank you, Cid." Vayne sighs.

"If you pulled that in Draklor, we'd be on you before lunch."

"I'm fairly certain the coffee is the only thing keeping half of you upright, so forgive me for not quaking in fear."

The meal ends much as it began, with simple ices flavored with grated ginger, and Penelo wonders what will happen next. What will be done with her and where it will all go from here, and she doesn't realize where her thoughts or her gaze has turned until she finds the Lord Consul looking back. Penelo drops her eyes immediately, though it is not fast enough.

"You are free to ask, you know."

Penelo might not be quite as terrified as before, but his gaze still makes her feel utterly transparent.

"Lord Consul?"

"Forgive me my hubris, but I can't imagine there's a citizen in Rabanastre who doesn't have at least one question for me, if not far more than that. Please ask, I will be glad to answer if I am able."

"I don't think I…"

"Try it anyway. Or if it seems more fair, I will trade you, one for one."

"Do you miss it?" Penelo says, searching for a safe way to start. "Your home?"

The Lord Consul smiles, knowing such a benign question has not been on anyone's mind, but too gracious to point it out.

"Archades? I miss the winds, yes. The heights. Watching the clouds chase each other across what seems to be the whole of the world. It certainly has its splendors. Did you find Bhujerba to your liking?"

So this is it. This is having a conversation with the Lord Consul. She can do this.

"I can't imagine anywhere more beautiful. The merchants from Bhujerba often seemed very proud - now I know why." Penelo bites a little at her lip, the second question not nearly so easy to ask. "What… are you planning to do in Rabanastre?"

"I would like to extend the airfield, for starters. I believe the city could benefit from the industry, and it would put us at an advantage this close to the border. We could expand perhaps in the Westersands, near the aerodrome."

"Not there." Penelo says, before she can think the better of it - but once more the Lord Consul does not react with anger or disdain, only quiet curiosity, waiting for her to explain.

"The old city, Raithwall's city extended beyond the current boundaries of Rabanastre." Penelo says. "The Westersand used to slope down into a valley, and the city went with it. Except the wells dried up there, and the desert took it back, but underneath it's still old buildings, tunnels instead of bedrock. The birds can walk on it, but you wouldn't want to even take a caravan across it, let alone try to build on top of it."

Know-it-all Penelo, who really ought to have more sense than to ramble on in front of the Lord Consul, but again he doesn't seem to mind.

"What exactly do you do here in town?"

All this time, and Penelo's kept Migelo's name out of this, but if the Lord Consul makes any attempt to look for her, the bangaa's name will show up soon enough. Trying to be circumspect now is only going to look like she has something to hide.

"I work for Migelo, the bangaa responsible for the fete. He was a friend of my father's. I run orders for him, and look after the shop."

And haul cargo, and chase down the people Migelo's too kindly to yell at and do all sorts of other painfully unimpressive things, but she's made a hash of enough today. The Lord Consul is intrigued by the odd association, she can see it, and she's surprised when it isn't the next thing he asks.

"And when you're not working?"

"I'm always working."

He raises an eyebrow, and Penelo blushes, glancing away. "I… dance."

"You weren't at the fete."

"I don't dance for coin."

It comes out sharper than she intended, less the pride she'd hoped for and a lot more like disappointment, a lot more like remembering her place. Funny how all this time it's the Lord Consul she's been avoiding and now it's Larsa she doesn't want to see. Maybe he already knew what she was when he'd dragged her out of the mine, but if not then he certainly does now.

"Well, then, the next time you will have to come as a guest." Vayne says.

"I think that would be quite excellent." Larsa adds.

Penelo keeps her eyes down - the blushing's worse, and she's being ridiculous and if she had any sense at all she'd stop here. Thank the Lord Consul for his offer and politely try to inquire about which door she might walk out of to get home. Except there are questions she does want the answer to, the impolite ones, out of place at such a pleasant party - but she can't quite convince herself the Lord Consul was lying, when he said she ought to just ask.

Penelo wonders if the princess is alive, but does she even want to know? If Ashelia has come back, what might happen next, and where that might lead? Oh, but she already knows where it will lead, or she wouldn't feel the dread of it. She wouldn't have to ask.

"How long would it take for you to destroy Rabanastre?"

Cid glances up, a slight frown on his face, but Vayne is as calm as ever, unsurprised by the sudden turn of the conversation.

"By airship? Thirteen hours."

The air is hot, but Penelo can feel the hair stand up on her arms, even under her gloves. She almost laughs at how fast he can answer, so quick and calm. It's better to hear it like this, though, the way Archadians no doubt speak with one another about the possibilities, even though idea of such casual annihilation makes her head spin.

"So long?"

"We would not likely invest the whole of the fleet in the enterprise."

"It will not happen." Larsa is there suddenly, leaning in toward her. "Archadia has never raised such arms against its own people so, nor will it. You have my word."

The Lord Consul seems as if he might wish to counter that, not in anger but caution, that his brother ought not to make promises he can't keep - but Larsa looks back fiercely, clearly willing to back up his vow to the very limit of his ability.

It's Vayne's turn to ask a question, but Penelo wonders why he even bothers asking anything of anyone, how he doesn't know everything about her already. It's difficult to remember all that's been said, all the secrets she's given up, or how she's done absolutely everything but keep her opinions to herself. At least he isn't likely to think her a spy - no spy could possibly be this stupid. All she can hope is that Vaan isn't foolish enough to return to the city, that Balthier might find a place for him and-

"How many people did my Empire take from you?"

"… That -that's not fair." Penelo doesn't mean to whisper, but it's suddenly very hard to breathe. "You can't… you can't ask me that."

"Penelo…" Larsa says, a tone full of apology even as he's glaring at Vayne, but the Lord Consul looks at her and there's nothing amused or dangerous or even proud in his gaze, only a quiet sort of patience. He looks exactly like an Emperor ought to look, not quite human and not quite stone.

"Five." Somehow the word comes, and Penelo is as surprised as anyone when more words follow. "My parents. Three brothers." Reks was close enough, more than close enough. "Vaan is all I have left. He's all I have in the world."

Vayne nods. He does not apologize for the war, because it wouldn't be honest and she wouldn't believe him. He doesn't promise peace or certainty, the way Larsa does. For a long moment, he says nothing at all.

"I did not ask to upset you."

"You didn't. It's only the truth." If Penelo were going to buckle beneath it, it would have happened years ago.

"The truth…" Vayne says, his eyes downcast. After a moment, he looks up at her with the same eyes as his brother, those vast and uncharted seas - though the odd, secret smile is all his own. "I will but speak it plain, then - what will it take to make you one of my advisers?"

"I… what?" How could she possibly have heard him right? "You have… people for that, Lord Consul, I'm sure. People who know… and I'm not…"

"I have those who tell me what they think I want to hear, or what they want me to hear. A few others, I think, will advise me as best they can about the city as they see it, but you seem to know its inner workings better than most."

Penelo frowns. "You want me to be a spy?"

The Lord Consul chuckles. "I wish to hear no more than you wish to tell. If I am to be proper Consul of Rabanastre, I must know how the city lives, and I do not have the time I need to learn it. I must make decisions now, with information I don't have - and those decisions will impact everyone, especially those least able to endure my mistakes. The only way to succeed is to look to those who live here for their guidance. You are who I need, Penelo, for the simple truth of being yourself."

Imagine what she might accomplish, if he's telling the truth. Lowtown might be spared, or at least she might argue for kinder treatment, a more careful understanding. What if he still used her, though, as a spy, and she didn't even know it? He's smart enough to do it, that's more than obvious. What kind of information might she reveal, what damage could she do without even knowing it?

Can she afford to turn him down? Will he let her turn him down?

"It would pay, of course. I am certain I could make it worth your time."

Enough money to get her parents' house back. He might even give it to her, if she asks. All for the price of her loyalty, helping the Empire that took everything from her. What would her mother say, her father and brothers? Could she even step through the door, knowing what she'd done to get it back?

Just think of the people she'd be able to help.

Vaan would never forgive her.

"I need… I need to think about it, milord."

"Vayne."

"_Lord Consul._" Penelo insists, and it earns her another smile. He is so dangerous. He is so sure. He has not lied to her, not yet.

"Please, take all the time you need. If your day has been anything like mine, you are still waiting for the room to stop spinning. I would extend an invitation to stay in the palace, as long as you would like. Or I would offer you a carriage, if you are to return home."

"Thank you, but I… I'll be fine. It isn't so far, and the walk will give me time to think."

"I will escort you to the gate." Larsa says, standing.

"Very glad to make your acquaintance." Cid says, and would obviously love to stand up and say goodbye properly if not for the book across his knees and the other one on top of that, and he settles for briefly taking her hand. "I hope we will see each other again soon."

"As do I." The Lord Consul says, and Penelo can pretend that maybe she won't, that she'll walk away and never come back; that he'll never try to find her and this will all be over - but if it were true, would he even let her walk away?


	35. the law of probability 11

Vayne watches his brother follow the girl out, a bit of tension fading from the set of Penelo's shoulders as she turns to look at Larsa, smiling shyly at whatever he's just said. His brother's hands are clasped behind his back - a nervous gesture, Larsa believes it makes him look more serious - and after a moment Gabranth moves, as always, to escort them out. It's not a stretch to say that the Judge Magister is less than happy with being back in Rabanastre so soon, or with having Larsa here - and he does not even know yet, of the particular souvenir Balthier has liberated from Nalbina.

At times Vayne almost wishes he was slightly less aware of the world. Life would be much more peaceful if his instincts were not set like a pack of wolves on the barest hint of a trail. He knows Larsa is not telling him the entire truth about Bhujerba, and how his path first crossed with Penelo's. It will be interesting to see how far Gabranth is willing to lie for him - his loyalty is to Larsa, as it ought to be, but Vayne will know the truth anyway, spoken or unspoken. Gabranth does not hide his concerns half as well as he believes he does. He knows that if Penelo had been taken as some lure for Balthier, the sky pirate would have been honor bound to rescue her. If Vayne checks the records of the aerodrome carefully enough, he will no doubt find a Strahl-shaped hole in some anonymous account.

He trusts Balthier, but if that is true it means that at some point his brother was likely in close proximity to Basch fon Rosenberg, a man who must truly desire Vayne's downfall in every way there is to wish for it; if he is even completely sane after two years chained and buried deep in the very epicenter of his failure.

Who could fault a man, so ill-served and undone for his nobility, for carving out his vengeance in the blood of whatever Solidor happened to cross his path? Who would say it was less than justice, a prince's life for that of a king? A portion of revenge for an equal serving of betrayal? No one would weep on Vayne's behalf, and many more might consider it no less than he deserved.

In his ruthlessness, he has finally placed his brother on the board. A piece he cannot remove, when there is no other way to keep him safe - and now, this.

"Larsa fancies her."

"Hm?"

Cid is cross-checking some bit of information, or perhaps taking down notes on a new theory he's just come up with or simply doodling in the margins, well aware that few will be smart enough to ever tell the difference. Vayne has often wondered, given his repeated inability to distract the man from any task, just how long it took Cid to notice Venat first hovering beside him. He can imagine the demigod patiently detailing the secrets of the universe, certain of its appreciative audience right up until Cid asked it to pass over a box-ended three-eighths wrench.

Vayne sighs, tilting his glass in the Doctor's direction. "Truly, you are the last romantic."

"I love a good engine manifold." Cid says. "Did I miss something?"

"Everything, most likely." It earns him a scowl, as Cid reaches for his own drink. The servants have come and gone, clearing the last of the dishes away, and for the moment they are quite alone. Of all the things Vayne had thought to accomplish today, playing chaperone to a budding infatuation had not quite crossed his mind. "And here I was starting to think I'd have to explain to him how not to get caught with the stableboys."

Cid snorts. "You have never had it off with a stableboy."

"Never been caught, at least."

"I thought she was very well-spoken." The Doctor says. "If the engineers here are half as competent as their merchants, it'll be worth my staying around."

Vayne could make the argument for it, that this has all been to some sinister end, Ondore training a pretty Dalmascan girl to the purpose… but even his capacity for paranoia has a breaking point. Either the girl's better at duplicity than he is - and that seems rather unlikely - or Penelo has no artifice in her at all, as baffled by the coincidences piled up around her as anyone could be. It's not entirely out of the realm of believability: the bangaa receives the job, the boy makes his absurd bid for defiance, leaving Penelo to to scramble for safety and petition Vayne as if he's the gatekeeper in a fairy story, some cautionary tale on silver-tongued monsters she must never, ever trust.

He hardly needs to dramatize. All her family dead and gone, her life taken away from her by a war she had no part in, and he the face of the Empire that had so thoughtlessly done the deed? As if that's not a good enough reason to fear him.

A fair justification for retribution as well - but if she had wanted to murder a Solidor, she had ample opportunity in Bhujerba, not to mention after. If she is in this for some more subtle purpose… Vayne cannot see it. No matter how hard he looks, she is only a girl, without pedigree enough to even be a royal mistress, not that Larsa would ever think along those lines.

Setting his heart on a war orphan, a foreigner with no wealth or title or House name? It is so like his brother.

"All this might finally be enough to send the Emperor to his grave," he muses. "We can cross that one off the list early."

Cid looks up at that, but doesn't speak. A misguided sympathy in his eyes, perhaps, though the Emperor's opinions no longer matter for anything past the purely practical, for keeping a step ahead of Gramis' goals.

"I do hope you'll stick around, Doctor, to provide some expert courtship advice."

Cid has his glasses perched on his nose, gazing at him over the rims gives the absurd moment an even more ridiculous sense of gravitas.

"Oh, come now." Vayne says. "No false modesty. I'm sure you were quite the lady killer back in the days of King Raithwall."

"I know where you sleep, and I have a cannon." Cid reminds him. "Besides, you know full well what happened to my attempt. Deflowered half of Ivalice, the way I hear it. Do you really want to be related to an entire new generation?"

"I saw him in passing." Vayne says. "Now that he has quit with Nalbina, I imagine Balthier will be after the Princess soon enough."

"… how does he fare?"

"Rather unhappy to see me." Vayne says. "In good health, though, and fair spirits for a man in irons, with the viera yet by his side. A spotlight and a musical cue would not have been out of place."

The rumor that he and Doctor Cid share some sort of sordid, private affair stems entirely from these sorts of moments, how very little between them needs to be spoken to be understood. A half-dozen emotions flit across the Doctor's face, one chasing the next, and Vayne knows better than to make mention of any of them.

"So…" Cid says, after a long pause, "I suppose it's time to give your brother the talk, then? Birds. Bees. Painfully laborious prenuptial agreements. The benefits of eloping to Balfonheim?"

Vayne smirks. "We got that over with years ago, when he took his first interest in chocobo breeding. He wished to know why humes didn't lay eggs, when it seemed, in his opinion, 'far more civilized.' I fobbed it all off on Drace."

Cid chuckles. "Good gods, I can't imagine how she took to that."

"Neither can I, which is why I'm certain she fobbed it off on Gabranth."

Cid laughs louder, no doubt trying to comport some image of the man out of his armor, let alone in any kind of passionate clinch. It's easier to imagine a chaise lounge caught in some torrid affair.

"You are certain he knows what women are _for_?"

"One would imagine so," Vayne says. "It seems when Gabranth was through explaining, my brother could not speak to a lady for over a week without choking on his words. Even Drace, which of course left her stammering as well."

"The things I miss, stuck in the lab." Cid says, perhaps the closest it's ever come to sounding like regret. "Speaking of labs, this business with the coffee…"

"I shall fix that presently." He had asked for an easy bribe, and the girl had certainly delivered. Coffee and skybikes were perhaps the southern version of bread and circuses, and would suit his needs quite well. "In the meantime, you may feel free to lay waste to the palace stock."

The bottle of champagne isn't quite gone, and as Vayne pours out the final drops he remembers the look Penelo had given him - she'd noticed the label, enough to be surprised at his choice. A personal favorite, though neither the most popular of sources nor the best vintage. When she wasn't busy being frightened, the girl certainly had her opinions on his tastes. It ought to be easy enough to find out if she is who she says she is, and Vayne is not quite above petitioning Migelo, should Penelo prove reluctant to return.

Somehow, he has the feeling she will take him up on his offer. His brother had not been the only one blushing his way through the meal.

The Doctor is counting up the measurements on his latest diagram, index finger twitching for the ones, his middle for the tens and ring for the hundreds. Every now and then the last finger makes note of a thousandths place, and his ledger fills accordingly, the dimensions of some new bit of tech he's introducing to the fleet.

After a moment, Vayne leans forward, to take a pen and a bit of parchment from the doctor's prodigious share, with a look to make sure he's not writing on the back of the next wonder of the modern age. He quickly jots down his orders, the papers for the girl, the decrees to bring skybikes and coffee back to the city, even a formal request for the meeting with the Marshalls, in case they should pretend to forget.

In the beginnings of the Empire, official legal documents were illuminated so ornately in the hopes of preventing fraud, the crests of the families always included, along with a near-unlimited number of other symbols. A marriage certificate between the right Houses might easily wallpaper half a room. The need for such securities is no longer what it once was - if it ever truly worked at all - but the fashion has continued to this day, most noblemen with a calligrapher dedicated solely to the purpose. House Solidor has an entire building just to house the archives, documents signed at various levels of sobriety by every Solidor who has ever been, the contract-makers sharing space with the official court historian on the floors above the stacks.

He has an official calligrapher on retainer, of course, but Vayne's not completely without ability. A common enough Rozarrian feint, to separate a man from his retinue in the hopes of delaying a contract for one reason or another. Being able to do the work himself had thwarted that particular ruse more than once.

Vayne is not so familiar with how such things have been done with contracts in Dalmasca, but Penelo would not likely have a crest of her own, even so. He sketches out the Solidor insignia, and makes a note for the contract-maker to look up how Migelo's last agreement was written. The bangaa seems to be her sponsor, or close enough for now. He suggests a border of vines and flowers, the common symbol for a growing partnership - though the flowers ought to be of Dalmascan make, with perhaps one of their tessellated borders to finish it off. It is a bit of a tall order on such short notice, but he imagines there ought to be some time for the scribe to do it up properly. Larsa will likely convince Penelo to take a turn through the gardens, and no doubt stay at the gate for as long as he can manage, scrambling for one more thing to say.

"Thirteen hours to destroy the city?" Cid says into the silence. Vayne had expected the question sooner or later. "I never heard that sort of strategy for the south bandied about, with all the time they spent figuring how long it would take to knock Bhujerba from the sky."

Neither plan was anything but absurd, especially concerning the sky island, well protected between their surplus of skystone and Archadian vacation homes. Still, every time Ondore made even the slightest gesture of annoyance the maps would come out and the plans begin anew.

Gramis had once attempted a coup on the island, early on in Ondore's rule, and its abject, magnificent failure had always made Vayne a bit fond of the Marquis. Cid utterly loathed the man, presumably for his lack of imagination when it came to scientific matters, though Vayne thought it might have more to do with the Archadian shipwrights Ondore had managed to lure away to Bhujerba, before Draklor had attained its current glory.

"Only conjecture, all before the war." Vayne says. "No one would consider it now. The Empire wished for an outpost here, a stronghold - not a demilitarized zone."

In considering such purgatories, he hopes the shipwright, Taneli, has a bit more information for him on Lowtown. A curious situation, like Old Archades without the centuries of constant use to render it permanent and untouchable. If he moves fast, he might well find a better situation for it, and those who live there. Vayne would have pressed Penelo further, but the girl seemed to be on her last vestiges of composure, and he has half a notion that she might even live there herself, or at least be quite familiar with the area. Despite its lawless reputation, Rhedan had mentioned most of Lowtown had been rented out to the poor by the shops above. A conversion of warehouse space into shelters, perhaps skirting legality but still clearly under their ownership.

Vayne can see it now, what would have surely pleased the High Marshalls and all the men aboard the _Tyche_, overstepping himself after the fete with a raid on Lowtown - all private property, well past his jurisdiction - and a move that would have gained him the unending ire of every merchant in a merchants' town.

He has every intention of overstepping himself, though not in the way they'll be happy to see.

"I'm think I'm going to require residency in Rabanastre for any Archadian wishing to do business here."

Cid grins. "You will never get that."

"Oh, but it will be fun to try." He gives it three days of meetings at most before they're running to the Emperor for help, but as long as it keeps Vayne occupied and out of Archades he knows damn well Gramis does not care what he does in Rabanastre. "If they do stick around, perhaps they can give the rebels some tips for their next insurrection. I think Ghis did more damage than the rest of them together."

"They did try to kill you."

"Everyone tries to kill me. It shows they're paying attention." He does wonder what it means, that the viera heard he was to be taken alive, when the Princess had clearly done her best to take his head off. A dissension in the ranks? A lack of conviction among even her closest allies, that his death was for the best? It might yet prove useful. "As it stands, I am rather in their debt. I doubt I'll have much problem with the budget, should we find ourselves in need of extra funds."

"Damn Rozarrian saboteurs." Cid says, though the words lack even a cursory heat. An odd fact of life, how many border disputes rise up precisely when it's time to open the coffers, for the Empires to show their dedication to national defense by the amount of gil they'll gladly spend on the newest, shiniest toys. And if an airship should misfire in some spectacular fashion, or a piece of lab work not turn out as planned, who's to say it isn't the work of some spy sneaking in undetected, requiring an emergency expenditure to set things right?

Of course, there are similarly convenient Archadian double agents causing problems all over Rozarria, right in all the places it will cost the most to fix.

It amuses him, the petty treacheries wrapped up in the hallowed banners of state, so much profit to be had in carefully tending such mutual dislike. Usually it amuses the Doctor too, but at the moment he is not smiling.

"I did not mean to worry you, Cid."

The Doctor makes a face, not bothering to look up. "Who was worried? What death would ever dare to cross a Solidor?"

Vayne glances toward the door, to where his brother has gone. He can't help it. If only he had the power any of these people feared he had. If only there was a way for an Emperor to wage war against circumstance.

"You know Gabranth won't let him set one boot past the gate." Cid says, knowing exactly where his thoughts have strayed. "He'll be fine."

"I'm sending him back home with you."

Cid scoffs. "You can't be that surprised by this. The first that we heard, when they announced you'd been hit - the rumors weren't good, Vayne. It was some time before we even knew… what else did you think he would do?"

"Larsa shouldn't be here."

Cid's expression changes, less chiding, more serious. Very serious. "You taught him too well. The boy… he knows something's wrong. He might not know what it is yet, but he _knows_. Maybe he thinks if he's obvious enough about looking, you'll tell him."

One of the few things they don't agree on, Larsa as yet unaware of what has happened with the Midlight Shard or Vayne's… condition. In his opinion, there is not a single reason his brother ought to know. If a solution can be found, then it will be as if it never happened, and there is no reason to make Larsa worry. If there is no solution…

"Sir."

Further contemplation is set aside for the moment, the messenger arriving along with the official after dinner _digestif_. The Doctor prefers cognac, generally of an age and strength similar to huffing solid Mist fumes, while Vayne has been presented with another gift of his new home, a tall, slender glass set in a shallow bowl of magicite alongside a decanter full of pale green that seems kin to a potion, though its healing powers are likely of a much shorter, if more entertaining duration.

The messenger bows. "The chef wished for me to inquire about the meal, and how many you might be expecting for dinner?"

"The meal was excellent, but dinner may be postponed indefinitely." Vayne says. "I believe the Doctor and I will take a tour of the aerodrome."

No doubt Cid will find something to immediately distract him for the next several hours, at least, and Vayne can see about setting a few plans in motion, at least getting some sense of the landscape. No reason not to believe the girl, that the area past the city walls is unstable, but she's never seen what pure Archadian stubbornness can do against the elements. If there's stone beneath the sand and it's solid enough to anchor to, all might not be lost. An excessive show of engineering might just manage to impress a few people, and prove his resolve.

"Tell him to pack something up for us, for later." He glances at Cid. "Or we could eat along the way?"

"The boy thinks he's funny…" The Doctor mutters. Only then does Vayne remember the spices in his pocket. A shame, he could have asked the girl. Maybe he'll make it her first official task, to educate him on what he ought to be eating.

"Here," he says, passing them over, along with his finished drafts. "Have him see what he can do with those, and please bring those papers to the contract-maker."

"Yes, Lord Consul."

"Maybe it isn't the most exciting meal. Maybe it's not all flash and bang and eating bits that aren't quite dead yet," Cid continues, quite capable of talking to himself even with Venat gone. Feigning insanity still proves a good way to get out of meetings. "It's about more than that. It's about tradition and respect and… solidity."

"Nothing like having to cut the gravy with a knife." Vayne agrees, and takes a sip of his drink. It seems to be one of those spirits that's brilliant when ice-cold, and likely undrinkable otherwise. He wonders how many of the desert's more violent flora were distilled into this particular batch - by the way his throat burns it seems most of them are still rather put-out about it.

"True Archadian dining requires a subtle palate."

Vayne nods. "The flavor of the brown does bring out the brown quite nicely."

Cid sighs, the sound of a patient man who does not deserve any of this. "You know, I'd bother to be offended if I thought you summoned me halfway across the continent for lunch."

Vayne smiles, and pours himself a double shot.

Cid makes a pained sound, though there's the beginnings of real worry in his gaze. "Gods, is it to be that smile already? Take pity on an old man."

"You don't like my smile? I've been told it's rather fetching, in its way."

He's been told it's his mother's smile, by those who best remember her and have thought to make some mention of it. The first Queen had been a quiet, reserved sort of woman, and it was the common sentiment that there was a good deal of her to be found in her youngest son. Vayne does not let himself think about her often, or what she would make of all this - he lost the right to fond memories long ago.

"I have learned what the Sun-Cryst is for."

Cid very slowly and deliberately sets down the paper he's holding, and pushes it to the side, picking up his drink instead.

"Well, then?"

Vayne tells him.

The doctor blinks, and swallows twice. Vayne takes another drink. Cid seems to have forgotten he's holding a glass.

"Repeat that last part back to me?"

"The part about the line of Dalmasca being gifted the Sun Cryst in order to erase all of Archadia back to the dawn of recorded time?"

"… that part. Yes."

The Doctor remembers his drink long enough to empty it, pour another round and finish it off just as fast, savoring the cognac as if it were threepenny wine. The next time he has such a revelation, Vayne needs to bring a second bottle, or smaller glasses.

"Usually to cock it all up this badly requires magic." Cid says, after a long moment's pause. "We did it with science. That's progress."

"Feel free to tell me I'm a proper lunatic, Doctor, and we can get on with the business of enjoying this lovely day."

Cid throws out one hand, a half-hearted gesture. "Oh, you're barking mad, says the man who's spent half a decade conversing with gods."

"Do you believe-"

A nod "It's entirely possible, if one considers the variables at play." Which may be the last thing Cid wants to do, but it doesn't stop him. Vayne can watch the Doctor thinking his way through the details on levels he doesn't even know to consider. "An engine designed to remake the world? Why not? So much Mist in so refined a chamber, over such a long period of time? Theoretically, there's no reason the Sun-Cryst wouldn't have the power to… alter whatever was intended. As for the Occuria… well, you are familiar enough with what happens when they conscript a vessel to carry out their will."

He lets his glasses fall, and rubs at his eyes, the gesture painfully weary. Maybe the trip to the aerodrome can wait.

"Doctor."

"Truly, it is not every man who learns in detail how much better off the world would be had he never been born."

All Vayne's responsibility - all of it - wishing to see the unfettered reach of a brilliant mind. What good is any world, without such a man in it? He will take all of the Doctor's supposed sins as his own, and gladly, for the privilege of seeing him as he ought to be. Somehow, he will find some absolution for Cid before the end.

"If you wished for me to rain down vengeance on you, you should not have made yourself so irreplaceable." Vayne says. "Keep drinking."

"A thousand men in Archades can turn a wrench. A thousand moogles, for that matter." The Doctor swirls the dregs of liquid in his glass, thoughtlessly. "I would ask, of course, just how it was you discovered we are all of us destined for catastrophe?"

"Raithwall. The Dynast-King himself, or the shade of such. Warning me of the fate that he could not avoid."

Cid's eyes narrow, not in disbelief but in suspicion. "… and you saw him _how_, exactly?"

Vayne sighs, and reaches out, plucking a piece of ice magicite from the shallow bowl. It glows a gentle, pale blue between his thumb and forefinger, before he clenches his hand around it. The pain is sharp, but brief, and he opens his hand to let the dull stone hit the table. No longer cold, carrying no haze of power - a simple piece of rock and nothing more.

Cid stares, and of course they both know the laws of magickal energy, the danger of spells lashing back upon their casters, and the fact that he has not been able to cast at all, not a single syllable since Nabudis.

"A clever enough party trick." Vayne says mildly. "I do think it wise that I avoid any further attempts on my life at present. At least those involving magicks."

"How much hit you?"

"Cid…"

"How _much_?"

"A flare spell at unexpectedly close range. I do believe dispelling it was better than the alternative."

Vayne can nearly hear Cid's teeth grind together, knowing full well that _absorbing_ is different than _dispelling_ and it damn well might have killed him - and there's no reason to mention that for a few moments, it nearly had.

"… and of course no one saw this happen. Which meant you, what? Went after the rebels alone?"

"I admit it seems slightly less intelligent in retrospect."

Cid wants to lash out at him, but it seems he's not certain how to begin, whether Vayne's recklessness, his self-destructiveness or his sheer idiocy ought to take center stage. It's far more disquieting when he sighs, giving up, shoulders sinking as he leans forward, head in hand. It ought not to take these sorts of moments for Vayne to remember that the Doctor is not a young man.

"Well that's it then, isn't it?" Cid says, his voice bleak as scoured stone. "Endgame. The girl is going to kill us all, either by mistake or design."

Technically, Archades would never exist _to_ kill, but there's little point in quibbling over detail. A slight comfort in the thought that Marquis Ondore might have just long enough to pat himself on the back before he disappeared with the rest of them.

"The stakes have changed. The game has not."

The destruction of the Sun-Cryst had ever been Venat's aim - now they simply know for certain the reason it must be done. Vayne's had nearly a full day to come to terms with the idea, and Cid is catching up fast.

"If we were to remove the girl…"

Killing the princess seems the easiest solution, but as with most things, easy rarely works. "According to Raithwall, she is the only thing holding them in check, else they would bestow their 'gift' unfettered. No doubt their next choice would serve us equally poorly."

The Doctor drums his fingers on the table. "… and of course there is no one to warn who would believe any of it."

"It would certainly be more convenient if it were all simple madness." Vayne says. "We may have some small consolation. Should she find her way to the Dawn Shard, supposedly it will show her why Raminas acted as he did. It might even be enough to convince her to stay her hand."

"Which only solves half the problem." Cid says. "You know the Emperor won't let this go. Now that the girl's been found alive, I doubt there's much chance of hiding her away again."

Doubtful the princess would think much of that plan, and Vayne can't say he's given it more than a glancing consideration. The idea that is forming is far less sane, and still missing a few key pieces, but there's no way around it. He cannot let Ashelia of Dalmasca die, he cannot let her take the Sun-Cryst and he cannot risk it falling into any other hands, even his own. A weapon that powerful, to unmake the whole world with an errant thought - it must be destroyed. A judgment that will put him at odds with the throne, and eventually he will have to show his hand. Rebellion in Archades is one thing, but to do it from Dalmasca will look like nothing less than treason against the Empire. The sort of insurrection they've been expecting from him for years.

Cid stares at him, because he's perfectly capable of taking all the facts to the same conclusion, and where another man might not believe Vayne capable of entertaining such abject insanity, the Doctor certainly knows better.

"I will need considerably more alcohol to continue this conversation."

Vayne smirks. "It's hardly my first choice."

"Well, _that's_ a relief." The Doctor says, rolling his eyes. The steadiness in his voice is betrayed by his free hand, which has strayed to his throat, to his wedding band, rubbing a thumb along the curve. "At least we have our backup plan."

It isn't quite the corner King Raminas had been backed into, though that isn't saying much either.

"If Archadia were to mass upon the border, Rozarria would have to respond in kind." Vayne says. "If we retrieve the Dusk Shard from Ghis, if the Dawn Shard can be regained from the Tomb, that's two fair pieces of leverage, and Draklor to potentially… mitigate the larger parts of the fleet."

Only a nebulous sort of idea, though an option he cannot afford to ignore. There are too many factors as yet out of his control, and that's not even considering what to do about the other Judge Magisters, or the Senate, or the Emperor himself. Still, Vayne has always considered something of the kind, in the end. Setting himself up against the Empire - and it would be no minor injury, to hurt Larsa so, but it might be the only way to sever his brother from the history of his House. It would prove to the people where his loyalties lay. If Larsa defeated him, in Archadia's name…

"That is not a plan." Cid says, with the suggestion that he knows a good deal of what Vayne's not saying and thinks just as poorly of it. "That is the third act of a bad penny drama."

"We have done worse."

"You do know all this conjecture means little, as long as she is still stuck aboard the _Ifrit_."

"Milord? Lord Consul?" A voice calls from around the wall, a hard voice. A soldier's voice.

"Enter."

The guard stops at the other end of the table, and bows. "I have news, from Judge Magister Ghis. The woman who led the attack, the lady Amalia. It seems, sir, that she has escaped."

Maybe the soldier wonders why the Lord Consul's answer is laughter instead of anger, or why the Doctor only shakes his head with a rueful grin, toasting his glass to no one. Perhaps he thinks about the odd, weighted look that passes between the two men, how amusement seems more than a bit out of place at a time like this - or the soldier might not question it at all. He might have long since heard his fill of House Solidor, the Lord Consul, and the mad old man in his employ. The safest thing, as ever, is not to ask, just salute and walk away in gratitude, that he is no more than the messenger.


	36. the law of probability 12

Of course there's a room waiting for her, if she wishes to change. Of course Larsa would think of such things before Penelo can even ask. He leaves her at the door, the Judge Magister following him towards the courtyard near the end of the hall.

The room - of course - is as perfect as every other inch of the palace. Maybe not quite fancy enough for a royal room, but more than spacious enough for her needs, with a full-length mirror and a privacy screen. A basin of fresh water with pale yellow flowers floating on its surface at one end,with a long expanse of marble floor and a small table set off to one corner, beneath a wide window covered by an ornate iron trellis. It might well be the sort of room she would choose for herself, if she were to work here, a quiet place to get a good deal accomplished.

"Stop it." Penelo murmurs, closing her eyes and taking a deep breath, letting it out slow. "Stop it _right now_."

Maybe she should have held off at the third glass of champagne, not that she's truly feeling the effects, sitting at the same table as an Emperor's heirs a rather remarkable boon to sobriety.

The Lord Consul's lying. He has to be lying, even if she can't imagine why he'd bother making requests when making demands takes much less time. Maybe he is, and she's just too dumb and provincial to know it.

Penelo stares into the mirror, one last moment with this other girl, a pretty Archadian with her hair and eyes and she can have this if she chooses, for today and tomorrow and who knows how long after. Penelo can live this life, if she's brave enough to try. Even before the Lord Consul had made his impossible offer, Penelo had been tallying up every bit of food on the table - the fish flown in fresh daily, the caviar that never passed a port less wealthy than Bhujerba - and if he had a taste for the new and the different she could offer him a dozen Dalmascan banquets before she'd risk repeating herself, and that's not even counting what they eat outside the city walls. If a little variety might put her in his favor - the Lord Consul is still dangerous, she's sure of it, but is he a danger to her?

Migelo will lose business, if she accepts. Business and friends and who knows what else. Dealing with the Lord Consul will make up for the missing gil, but not the damage to his reputation, and she'll be in House Solidor's pocket then, obviously not a place anyone with sense would want to be.

Penelo has sense. What she doesn't have are options - and if it works? If he makes things better, if Penelo can make a real difference for Rabanastre, does it even matter if they despise her for it?

_So this is what you're worth, hm?_ The walls themselves might as well be talking to her, the palace of her homeland now claimed by outsiders, stirred by a lonesome desert wind - the king murdered, her family gone, Reks himself one of the last victims of the war. _A few crumbs from his table and you're so willing to serve._

What should she do, elsewise? Throw his consideration back in his face? Forget that he had plans for Lowtown, and that no one else will give him reason to stay his hand?

_Ah, and that's all it is? Such selflessness? Look at you, with those pretty gloves and pretty jewels. Be as high-minded as you like, you still know the truth of it._

The truth is Penelo never could have dreamed of a day like this, a tour of Bhujerba, a trip home aboard a private airship. Being treated like a lady, with servants and favors and easy conversation - a guest. She's in the _palace_, and even at the best of times her father had never walked the halls so freely. Isn't this what it's all about - isn't this the moment she's been waiting for? Deals like this just don't happen, not even once in a lifetime - what's all the hard work in the world worth if she's too afraid to take the risk, to reach for the opportunity when it comes?

_"What would happen to us, you and me, if the Empire left tomorrow? I'd still be here with nothing, and you'd still be here."_

It's Nia's voice arguing in her defense, proud and mercenary, cutting down the ghosts of Penelo's conscience, those whispers of shame and doubt - and she absolutely knows what the other girl's advice would be. Use the Lord Consul's favor to go as far and as high as she can, if that means working in the city or in a job running the coast, sourcing him the best catch of the day. Do what her father taught her - bury the rich man in luxuries, as long as it pays - and if he turns out to be such a monster and there's no way out, she can always poison him, or kill him in his sleep. No need to betray her conscience after all.

"Milady?"

The maid announces herself at the door, and she's holding Penelo's old clothes - although they don't look old anymore, washed and mended and ready to be worn. Her boots have been polished, too, and Penelo can see that they've even been resoled, a task she'd been putting off until she might cut a deal to afford doing both at once. It seems her whole life has been shined up and handed back to her, a parting gift.

_Selling your soul for so little…_ The city chides.

_Buy it back at wholesale._ Nia snaps in response. _What do you think happened to them, all those girls you think ought to be here? The Dalmascans who cut their deals before the war? I bet they don't think about you at all, or their duty to the country I bet their families are still alive._ Penelo knew she had it in her to hurt, to mourn. She hadn't realized she could be this angry. _You don't owe them your life, or your happiness._

Slowly and carefully, the dress and the gloves and the corset come off. Unlike Larsa, Penelo doesn't even forget to remove the earrings. If the servant is at all surprised by the clothes she's stepping into, or that the dress needs to be delivered elsewhere, she's too polite to show it. Penelo will have to think up a gift for Rhiale to repay her kindness. It might be best to wait for the wedding announcement, as good a chance as any that Migelo will be asked to set up that celebration as well. Whatever strange spark of luck has brought her here, Penelo hopes it will pass on to those she's met, that Rhiale will find someone here she might come to care for.

"Did you have a nice time today, milady?" The maid asks shyly, as Penelo tugs her bracelets into place, and reaches into her pocket - where Balthier's handkerchief is waiting, newly pressed and folded, because of course it is.

"I did," she says, and somehow it's true.

* * *

Penelo feels saner and safer back in her own clothes, although she still doesn't feel much like herself, even with every ornament gone and her hair braided back up into place. It seems like anyone who looks at her will be able to see every fear and doubt, all that she's done and that she might do, some new, Archadian understanding clinging to her even now.

Larsa is waiting in the gardens, though not without company. He is seated at the edge of a fountain, gently stroking the neck of a brilliant emerald chocobo, perhaps one of the ones she'd heard earlier. Behind him, a small, blue chick is hopping about in the water, its feathers only half a shade darker than the sky. They aren't a common breed in Dalmasca, perhaps a gift for the Lord Consul's arrival.

Unlike most other chocobos, the blues have webbing between their claws, spreading their feet out wide. At top speed on calm waters, they can even run along the surface of a pond or lake, though for a barely-hatched chick in a fountain this mostly means a lot of splashing and tossing water in all directions while looking bewildered by its utter failure. The green chocobo is irritated by such exuberance, ruffling its feathers each time a stray drop falls, sighing deeply when the chick trips awkwardly and lands beak-first in a gap in the statue at the center of the fountain, making muffled sounds of increasing panic as it tries and fails to pull itself out.

"Careful there. You'll hurt yourself."

Larsa comes to the rescue in an instant, ignoring the thorough soaking from the struggling bird and the calf-deep water, using his coat to wrap up the frantically kicking legs.

"Easy, it's all right now."

Carefully, he wraps one arm around the chocobo's body, his other hand gently guiding its head free.

"There now. No harm done."

The little bird chirrups in happiness. The green lets out another sigh. Larsa makes an attempt to wring out his coat, to seemingly little benefit. His hair is hanging in his eyes, right until he sweeps it back, tipping his head toward the sun with a smile, and Penelo feels a pang of protectiveness so sudden and sharp it takes her breath away.

He's worth the risk. Larsa's worth trusting, worth tossing aside every bit of payback she might deserve and loyalty Dalmasca might be due. Even if it goes wrong somehow, Penelo knows it won't be because he didn't fight for her, because he didn't try. If he's going to give her his kindness and his loyalty, the least she can do is believe in him, and do what she can in return.

A wark of curiosity breaks the silence, and then the blue chocobo is hopping around her, stubby wings flapping in excitement at discovering a new arrival. Penelo kneels down, running a hand along the damp, downy feathers, the bird still little more than a baby. When Larsa's shadow falls across them it chirps again, making a mad little figure-eight of glee around the both of them.

"And my plan to greet you smelling like wet bird is a rousing success," Larsa mutters, wet and wrinkled in his undershirt, the coat a lost cause.

"It suits you." Penelo says, because it does, and she has the suspicion that this is often the way it is with Larsa, and perhaps even with the Lord Consul. Leave a Solidor to their own devices for too long and they'll find some way of keeping themselves occupied, propriety be damned.

He's happy to see her, even though Penelo's back to being the girl who stumbled out of the mines, even though it ought to be clear to him now that there's no other girl she can be. The four of them make for an odd, slow parade across the grounds, the green chocobo mostly pacing alongside them, the blue chick running ahead or behind or failing to hop a hedge or catch some bug only it can see. The Judge Magister stands in the far corner of the garden, close enough to keep sight of them but far enough that they can speak without being overheard. It is as private as things have been since Bhujerba - though that has been only hours ago, not the lifetime it now seems.

"I am truly sorry, Penelo, for the loss of your family."

He is. Larsa honestly is, and maybe it shouldn't matter but it does. Mother would have adored him. Father would have been thrilled by Penelo being here at all, let alone making such a connection, and her brothers would have teased her mercilessly when they weren't busy asking him about ships and birds. Larsa would have been welcome in her home, and gladly. Penelo nods, not quite trusting her voice. Thankfully, he seems to understand.

"My Lord Brother should not have said that about Rabanastre."

"I did ask."

Larsa shakes his head. "You don't have to worry. He would never allow it."

Except the Lord Consul isn't the Emperor, and even an Emperor has advisors and Senators and Judge Magisters and who knows what else, with wars to plan and fight and win and people in great cities all making demands, and there's no saying what tomorrow might bring. Penelo's had a few years now, to learn how fast the world can change, and all the ways in which she is entirely expendable.

"It might not be in his power to change."

Larsa frowns, his expression thoughtful and distant, as if he has considered as much already. "The situation with Rozarria has not improved, and the Lord Consul's position here, so close to the border… he puts a great deal upon himself." True enough, though Penelo doesn't think Vayne Solidor would be satisfied with any less. "Too many have already suffered, there must be some way of making peace. We do not have to come to bloodshed."

"What are you thinking?" Penelo says, and she remembers the way Vayne had looked at his brother, annoyance covering for worry at even seeing him in the palace - and it was a risk for him to come here. Maybe a small risk, but Larsa had also gone to the mines in Bhujerba without a guard, with no idea what he might be walking into. As reckless an adventurer as Vaan, perhaps, but where Larsa's plans were that much more careful, the risks and consequences were surely far greater.

"Be careful," she says. "You shouldn't do anything dangerous."

"I must do what I can, to help my Lord Brother and my country." Larsa sees her worry, and his determination gentles slightly. "The stewardship of Archadia and her people is my obligation, as much as anyone else's. If I am to do right by my House, I cannot put anything else, not even myself, above their well being - or yours."

"We'll be fine." Penelo says, holding back the absurd urge to call for the Judge Magister, and she has the sudden thought that perhaps his real occupation is to protect Larsa from himself. "We survive, we always have." It makes her ill, to imagine him braving danger for her sake, and Penelo reaches for his hand before she realizes what she's doing, clutching it the same way she'd grab for any other child in Lowtown about to make some idiot mistake. "Promise me that you won't go into the city alone."

Larsa's not a Lowtown orphan, though, and she can't ask him to do anything, let alone _demand_ it… even though that's exactly what she's doing. Penelo drops her eyes, and knows she ought to apologize, even if he is not quick to draw his hand away.

"I dare say I would prefer it if you were my guide. I have rarely found Bhujerba more enjoyable." Penelo's the one who reached for him, and she's still startled by how close they're standing. "Might I call on you, when things have calmed down?"

It's difficult enough to consider a business proposition, that the Lord Consul wants her here because she's useful, because she'll serve some purpose. It's another matter entirely, when there's no pragmatism to be found. If Larsa was too polite to simply throw her out on her ear, Penelo had at least expected his embarrassment, an awkward distaste at realizing she was every bit the commoner she seemed. Instead, he seems to think this is only the first day of their acquaintance, blind to everything she can see as the obvious barrier to anything but a temporary alliance.

"Larsa… I'm not…" Penelo makes a vague gesture at her clothes and her - her _everything_. "This is me, who I am. Just this."

He's looking at her - and he doesn't stop looking. The same steady gaze as his brother, though it makes her nervous for entirely different reasons.

"I don't know exactly who you are, Penelo, that is true - but I would very much like to learn."

Is she blushing? Penelo shouldn't be blushing. It's just one of those things refined gentlemen do, that his words all sound like compliments. The brilliant and charming Archadian noblewomen Larsa no doubt spends the rest of his time with, they'd know exactly how to respond, but coy flirtation is the one dance Penelo's never learned the steps to. Rather useless, when she'd been busy enough with living, and afterward there'd never been a compliment that hadn't come without a price attached, calling her pretty in the hopes of a discount, or some way of sneaking into Migelo's favor. It should be the same with Larsa, but nothing at all is the same with him. If he were any other boy she'd have already thought about how handsome he is - and he is - but it seemed so obvious and silly and pointless to make note of it and she really does need to _stop blushing_.

"Wark!"

"Kupo!"

Thankfully, while she's been stumbling through new ways to be ridiculous, the green chocobo has been scouring the gardens for food, shiny objects and threats - and there's no telling which it thinks the moogle dangling from its beak might be. The bird has thankfully only grabbed their new arrival by his accoutrements, and the moogle flails at it for a moment before sighing in resignation. The blue chick hops up and down, chirping with excitement as Larsa frowns, though there's a good deal of amusement hiding in his eyes as he steps up to the chocobo, arms crossed.

"If you would be so kind?"

The bird chirps, the sound oddly muffled around a mouthful of belt, and tilts its head, reluctant to let go of its prize. Larsa clears his throat a bit more sternly, and the beak snaps open, the moogle's wings fluttering just fast enough for him to land on his feet. Penelo assumes he's here for Larsa, startled after a moment's pause to realize the moogle is holding the document case out to her instead. The green chocobo preens at its feathers as if it never had an interest in any of them.

The case bears a wax seal, the blue crest of House Solidor in miniature. Archadians are amazingly fussy with their contracts but at least it means there's always a copy somewhere - they do tend to keep to their word when it's all set down in script and gilding. Penelo unrolls a pair of documents, physical evidence of the unbelievable, should she need the reminder. An official contract to become the Lord Consul's advisor, just waiting on her signature - and a full pardon for Vaan of 'any and all crimes for which the accused has been charged or sentenced for.'

Penelo rubs her thumb over Migelo's crest, the one he had her come up with for just these sort of contracts. Of course Vayne would know how to find it. He probably knew everything about her before she'd ever left the room. Penelo had been the one to create it - the silhouettes of three birds in flight, one for each of them, after Migelo had insisted she and Vaan be included, rising above a field of white wildflowers that had always been her mother's favorite. Penelo had sketched it fast out without much thought, and she'd never really considered what it would look like, how official it would be in paint and gold.

"My Lord Brother is quite skilled at choosing those best suited for the task." Larsa says. "I hope you will consider his offer."

Penelo thinks that maybe, she might have said no to the Lord Consul. If she tried, she might have convinced him that it was just too dangerous for those who depended on her, that she wouldn't be strong enough to choose helping Dalmasca over being hated by it.

Saying no to Larsa is just not going to happen.

The city bell rings out, faintly audible even from inside the palace, and it isn't that late but it makes for a good excuse.

"I need to go."

"You are still determined to make your own way home?"

"It isn't far."

Larsa bites at his lip slightly, and for all his wise words and thoughtful moods, for a moment he looks exactly his age. Even the chocobos seem to notice the change in his mood, the green leaning in to nudge him with its beak, the blue warbling uncertainly near her kneecaps.

"It's silly of me," Larsa says, "but it feels like once I let you leave, you will disappear forever. Promise me that you won't?"

Penelo is rather sure she's used up _all_ her life's surprises with today. The only thing that might keep them apart is Migelo never letting her out of the shop again.

"If you promise me that you'll stay in the palace."

Larsa nods. "All right, I promise. If you'll agree to keep something safe for me."

The Judge Magister is still on the far side of the courtyard, too distant to see it when he takes the Nethicite from his pocket and hands it to her.

"Larsa, I can't take this."

But when he folds her fingers around it - she lets him.

"If I am found with it, there will be trouble _and_ scolding." He grins, the sort of smile that could convince anyone do anything. "You can't possibly wish such a fate on me."

"You said it was valuable. Rare." Priceless, actually. Penelo's pretty certain it's priceless - and suddenly sure that what she's feeling is more than just simple protectiveness. Oh dear.

"It is. So I know I can trust you to be careful with it, until we see each other again."

How is it that he can say such things, and they always carry the weight they're supposed to? Penelo's a trader five generations deep, the whole business is about fancy words and fancier promises, pleasant flatteries that mean nothing even before they're said - but it isn't that way with Larsa.

Penelo's wanted nothing more than to escape the palace from the moment she set foot inside, but now it seems to take all her strength to step out through the gate. The blue chick tries to follow her, and there's a moment of laughter to break the tension as they corral him back into the gardens, the green bird nestling down to play grudging nanny to the adorable menace.

"Thank you, Larsa, for everything."

Out of the corner of her eye, Penelo can see her own warped reflection in the Magister's armor, standing right beside them now that Larsa's near the exit. Gabranth must hate the very idea of her - pardon certainly hadn't been on his mind in Bhujerba, but whatever he thinks of all that's happened, the meal or the offer Vayne has made or even the heat of day, there's nothing but silence behind the helm.

Larsa smiles. "The pleasure was mine."

Halfway down the path toward the outer wall, Penelo glances back, half-certain he's already gone. Larsa is still there watching her, and raises a hand in farewell. She returns the gesture, and nearly walks into the guardsman waiting at the bottom of the path. The soldier bows to her, and Penelo takes one more moment to savor it, this strange world that has paused to allow her a glimpse inside, and then she's alone again at the edge of Rabanastre.

It feels strange just walking home, each step oddly off-balance, as if the world around her is no longer as vast as the world inside her head. Penelo picks at the wax seal on the case until it's a meaningless blob, until the case might contain any sort of missive or inventory from one of Migelo's rich clients. The Nethicite is hardly a weight at all, but Penelo is aware of even the slightest shift of it in her pocket - invaluable and entrusted to her. A promise and a secret, just for the two of them - and she's blushing again.

The carefully paved lanes around the palace give way to more roughly cobbled paths, and Penelo ducks into a shortcut along an empty side street. With no one to see, she lifts up on her toes and spins for the sheer joy of doing so, scraping free small puffs of dirt and swinging her arms around like a child. The city is safe for the moment, and Vaan's safety has been ensured by the hand of the Lord Consul himself.

"Penelo?"

The voice, low and smooth, doesn't startle her. Turning to see the viera who's hailed her, now _that_ is a bit of a surprise. It's Krjn, from the clan hall. Penelo knows of her, even though they've never spoken - viera tend to be well known, with so few of them in town - though she can't imagine what Montblanc's partner would ever need from her. The expression on her face must betray the sort of day she's had, she can see the viera's expression soften, one hand raised as if she were a nervous beast in need of calming.

"I have been sent for you, by… recent acquaintances of negotiable repute, as well as friends who wish to see you safe. They wait for you outside the city. I will take you to them."

If it were anyone else, Penelo might yet be skeptical, but she's not even certain a viera can lie, let alone whether they'd ever bother.

"Penelo!?"

"Oi, Pen!"

Penelo stifles a grimace as two more voices bash their way into the moment, Kytes and Filo tumbling around the corner with equal expressions of curiosity and excitement. Always looking for some new mischief, far too good at getting involved at business they ought to leave alone and she can see they've clearly marked her as the best entertainment to be had. Which is fine, as long as she can at least keep them in the dark about where she's been.

"I told you it was her." Kytes says. "We saw you come from the palace!"

Damn it all.

"We heard from Migelo, that they took you to Bhujerba. He's worrying his tail off. Was it really sky pirates?" Filo doesn't look as much relieved at Penelo's safety as annoyed that she didn't get abducted too. "How did you get away? Are the pirates still around?"

"Why were you in the palace?" Kytes asks. "Did you go to steal something like Vaan did? What'd you get?"

"What happened?" Filo says, the two of them talking over each other. "Who's the viera? Is that the one that was with the sky pirate?"

Penelo swears she hears Krjn snort softly, but the viera's expression doesn't change and there's no more time to consider it before Kytes is tugging at the scroll case in her hand.

"What's that? Where's Vaan? Why'd you go to the palace?"

"Okay. Okay, wait." Penelo takes a step back, keeping the case firmly out of reach, trying for her best serious adult voice that occasionally almost works. "I need to go now, but I'll be back soon. I need you both to go tell Migelo that I'm safe, and that Vaan's safe. Tell him we'll be home as soon as we can. Don't say any more about sky pirates, or the palace and… and tell him not to panic if the Lord Consul sends any notes."

Or shows up at the door. Before today she thought she had at least some idea of what Vayne Solidor was about, restricted by the sensibilities of his status if nothing else, but now Penelo is certain she has no idea what he is truly capable of.

"What do you mean if…?" Kytes starts, but there's no good way to explain that and thankfully Krjn seems to understand the need for a quick retreat, already moving up the street, Penelo stepping backward as fast as she can follow, tossing platitudes to cover her escape.

"Everything's okay. Just tell him not to worry. It's all going to be okay."

* * *

Penelo vanishes as quickly as she'd appeared, following the viera down another street and out of sight, moving toward the East gate. Who knows where she's going? Who knows where she'd been? Usually she's the one scolding them for not being where they're supposed to be or doing whatever work she thinks they ought to be busy with. It's not like she doesn't take care of them, but Penelo can be kind of boring when she's not getting kidnapped.

"Where is she going with that viera?" Filo says, still convinced she would have made the much better hostage. "And what was she doing at the palace?"

"That was an Archadian contract." Kytes says. "Why do you think she had it?"

"Sky pirates?"

"The Lord Consul?"

The two of them look at each other, and start to giggle.

Penelo's going to be in _so much trouble_.


	37. a conspiracy of cartographers 1

The hum of the airship engines is remarkably quiet, Archadian ships and their commanders all such subtle destroyers. A rumble that seeps into Ashe's bones and intrudes on her thoughts all the same. She shifts on the narrow bench in the tiny room, wondering how long she's been inside. It feels as if an age has passed. Exhaustion pushes at her like itchy roving behind her eyes, the soft murmur of the_ Ifrit _as a constant reminder that two years of planning and determination have all ended here. Trapped in the confines of an impenetrable Archadian warship, in abject failure on her way to an even more total imprisonment - or worse.

Who knows where Vossler is, or any of those who fought so valiantly in Dalmasca's name. Ashe doesn't even know of the fate of the pirate or his unfortunate crew, and even if he was not there to aid her she does not like to think of him dead.

She keeps her back straight, her poise commanding and her chin held high, even though there is no one watching. It had been bad enough, escorted between the soldiers like a prize, with the Judge Magister's smug satisfaction as their vanguard, but Ashe thinks this might be worse. Ignorant of what is happening or when her situation might change, with no idea of where she will end up or why they haven't simply executed her.

An easy enough task, to kill a girl who is already dead.

Vossler had feared exactly this, he had counseled caution and patience but there were others who had assured her it was now or not at all, those who would not wait around to see what Vayne Solidor would make of the city - of her city, and her people. Oh, to be there in the shadows, forced to listen to that poisoned speech, to hear him invoke her name and her father's name and the people, the people had _cheered_ for him…

Two years of patience, and to have Vayne Solidor's heart at the point of her blade and fail to end it. If it had killed her to finish him Ashe would not have begrudged it, to know that final satisfaction as she ran him through, and that her triumph would be the last that he would ever see.

Two years of hiding and planning and cowering in corners, and now she has even less than that, not even the dream of vengeance and a land restored to shore up her resolve.

Not even her wedding ring, the one memento Ashe had managed to cling to for all these days - preferring hunger to handing it over - but the pirate had set his price and she had been desperate enough to be stupid, and now he is dead in Nalbina and she has only a thin, pale line against her hand and the hope that she might die before it fades.

Frustration knots itself deep into each of her muscles, demanding action, not at all the first time she wishes she had been born a prince, a warrior meant for battle. Destined to die at Nalbina, perhaps, but at least there with a sword in her hand.

If only there were a way to transmute her rage into a worthy purpose. Ashe has pondered it countless times, staring into the darkness in some borrowed bed, some dry corner of a storage shed or a chocobo's stable or whatever shelter Vossler had found for the night. If Ashe could only make her vengeance burn as it ought, Archadia would lay in desolation, and never think to cross their borders again.

Truly a foolish fancy, a child's contemplation - at least until the pirate had told her of the Dusk Shard, and the reason that it sang in her presence. Balthier spoke of the Midlight Shard, and she had heard the name whispered once or twice after the loss of Nabudis; old legends, the gifted relics of the Dynast-King, presumed lost to time if they had ever been real at all. Ashe had always thought her father kind, for how he tried to shelter her to the end, but she is no longer as certain of him as she needs to be.

The pirate spoke of it all so knowingly, as if it were not her heritage but his own. Balthier had been surprised at Ashe's ignorance and she lacked any explanation for him, or for herself. How she had never been told of all he spoke of, supposedly the birthright of those who had come before her. Did her father know of the Dusk Shard? No, he could not have, to keep such a weapon at his disposal without ever speaking of it, or wielding it against their enemies, even at the end, even at Nalbina.

Why did he never tell her? Had he searched for it - but how could she have missed that? Surely the palace vaults would have been turned upside down in desperation. He would have told her, if he'd known - but how could he _not_ have known?

Ashe had lunged for the Dusk Shard, a few moments after they'd boarded the _Ifrit_. The guards believed she'd been subdued, the Judge Magister off his guard and she'd taken her chance. For a moment it even seemed she might win. Her hands had even brushed against the smooth, cool surface and Ashe remembered Vayne Solidor taunting her, how she lacked the nerve to finish him if Rabanastre must fall as well. An Imperial airship was not the city, though, and well worth the price of her life. Ashe had been prepared for that end, hands tight on the reins of her hate and her determination, flinging her will into the stone as she would with the strongest of magicks, wishing and hoping and commanding - _Burn them. Do it. Kill us all._

Nothing happened. No whisper of power, no spellsworn vengeance rushing to her aid, not even the faintest glimmer of light. All Ashe received for her valor was a blow to the head from the hilt of a soldier's sword, before Ghis had thrown the guard away from her, shouting about how she was not meant to be harmed.

Not yet, Ashe thinks. Not yet. They have plans for her first. Oh, and she's heard a good deal about the Empire and all they like to do behind closed doors. Her jaw aches, to match the twinge in the straightness of her spine and the place where she'd been struck, but she does not tremble, or tuck her legs up and wrap her arms around herself the way she had done as a small child, or in those long, blank days after they'd come to her with news of Nalbina.

Who could imagine how much she'd come to hate a place she's never seen?

The Archadians sent a healer to deal with the cuts and scrapes she'd collected from her bid at escape, but Ashe refused him before he could step past the threshold. Let another be their perfect, pretty hostage. She ignores the food they leave just inside the door, even thought her stomach seems to have grown claws, even though it is obviously a better meal than she's had in months. The courtesy is not for her, but for the prisoner they believe her to be, and so there is nothing to eat.

If Ashe were truly brave, she would kill herself, here and now, without a single insult or desecration to her honor. Let her body burn upon the fire that had consumed her name some two years ago, and be done with it. Ashe clutches her hands tight along the bench, and stares past the opposite wall, the floor and ceilings all the same blank, flat gray and she kept breathing, even if each beat of her heart feels more and more a betrayal of the braver girl she ought to be.

At first, the sound slips in and out beneath the rumble of the engines, easy to ignore because it ought not to exist. It takes a long time for Ashe to realize someone is singing, and that she knows the words - it's a courting song, one of those that sounds like a lament, a desperate plea even if the love between lord and lady is certain. Ashe knows… she knows the voice even if she never had need for such favors, even if she'd been courted for so many years in so many small ways that by the time the vows were made there had never seemed a moment it might be otherwise.

Rasler is in the room with her. A pale ghost, green-blue and flickering like light through water, but he is there and he is singing and when he sees her looking, he smiles.

"Hello, my beautiful one. My brave love."

Ashe pushes herself back into the corner of the room, all false stoicism abandoned, the breath rushing out of her. Funny that she should be so frightened, to finally go mad when she had wished for it through all the dull and leaden hours after her exile, or Nalbina. When what remained of the army had finally stumbled home, when his body lay cold before her and sanity seemed so pointless, without use or value.

"You aren't mad, Ashelia. Beloved. My wife."

Rasler wears the armor he died in, though it bears not a single scratch or mark of battle, and his is the same kind and noble face that whispered to her on starlit terraces, of nervousness and determination - and love. The way he'd leaned in and told her how much he loved her, a private confession even as they made their way to be wed, and later, on their wedding night, when he'd come to her like a man finally finding home and Ashe had never known the joy - even more than her own fierce love - of meaning so much to another.

"You can't be real."

He kneels before her, close but not quite touching. He cannot touch, she can still see right through his hands, past the gleam of a ghostly wedding band.

"I am as real as you want me to be."

He looks so young. A brow unfurrowed by the weight of an unexpected crown and the tragedy that set it there, his eyes clear of the endless plans, the strategies and determinations, working always against unfavorable odds. No sign of the strange, frozen set of his expression when he had left her that final time, and though Ashe remembers his kiss and his embrace when she thinks of that moment it is only of the swirl of his cape and the set of his shoulders as he walked away forever.

Whatever this Rasler is, his eyes are clear of all but adoration, and it sticks in her with all the memory of losing home and husband.

"No." Ashe whispers, the word a litany she has no power to stop. "No no no no."

It must be some Archadian trick, to make her think she's gone mad, or perhaps it is not even that and this is just their way of amusing themselves, a bit of torture for the long journey home. The false vision of her husband does not move from his genuflection, not the slightest waver of a man of flesh and blood but the worry in his eyes for her - that _is_ her Rasler, and she cannot bear to see it.

"I never wished to see you weep."

Ashe is crying - stupid, stupid useless girl - in great, hot tears that bubble over from whatever's broken inside of her, that make it so difficult to speak. Rasler had not had time for her pleas, not in those final hours. Ashe remembers how it was, to be kindly but firmly set aside - it was her job to wait, to have faith and trust, and she had done as she was bid and they were all dead now.

"Oh my gentle Queen, to be given no more courtesy than the weakest pawn. To stand as the noble sacrifice of those you trusted, who were themselves betrayed. Your father believed he might treat with Archadia for peace, but such false empires only respect power, and ruthlessness."

An offer, hidden in his words, not hidden at all well but that is likely the point. He is not Rasler, this is not a reunion. Ashe forces the tears back, curbed further by a sort of morbid curiosity. She is helpless aboard a ship that every moment takes her further from home, toward imprisonment, torture, execution - likely all of these, and with that in mind there is no reason not to entertain such delusions. What can this illusion possibly do that is worse than what is coming?

"What do you want?"

"I want to see you smile again, love."

Ashe smiles, but it is bitterl."My husband never spoke to me so, with such endearments."

"His mistake."

It is not him, Rasler is not real and not here and yet she has to keep her hands clasped so tight in front of her, to keep herself from reaching out, to run her fingers through his hair and they had _so little time_ together. Nothing at all to call a life, with all her memories buried beneath what came after. There are times she wonders if those brief, beautiful days had happened at all.

Ashe knows she ought to strike out at this creature - whatever it is, whatever dares to wear his face, but she can't. The lie is still better than being alone.

"What are you?" She whispers, nails digging into her thighs hard enough to hurt. "What do you think I can do for you?"

"I desire what you desire, to right the wrongs that have been done to you, and to Dalmasca. I long to see you tread upon the broken fangs of Solidor, and see all Archadia bow before you."

Rasler never spoke so - but then, she was never there, in those the meetings when the battle lines were drawn and the plans arrayed. Ashe wasn't there, when he learned of Nabudis, the deaths of father and mother, brothers and sisters and all he'd ever known. Dalmasca was not the home he chose for himself, and she'd done all she could to be that safe harbor, but he still woke in the night, shouting, angry - and he would always apologize, and never show that side of himself to her. It did not feel like Rasler was protecting her, but that she was not worthy of seeing it, not strong enough to know him true. Her husband had never truly confided in her, either his darkest fears or his most vengeful desires.

So little time for the two of them. Ashe has been a widow far longer than she'd ever been a wife. She stares at her fists - pale, delicate, _useless_ - and strangles her voice into a toneless calm.

"… how would I accomplish such a thing?"

"The treachery of Archadia lies deep, they have betrayed more than you know. The Shards are your birthright, set down from the Dynast-King, so that such an Empire could not rise to threaten those the gods have blessed. The sins that have been wrought, the blasphemy of those who would dare to challenge-"

"I can't use the Dusk Shard." Ashe blurts out, hating it that her voice cracks, that he hears her weakness and knows her failure. "I tried. I tried to stop them, but it didn't work."

"Oh, Ashe. Oh, my darling." He is just a little bit amused by her naiveté, another expression Rasler never wore. "You are meant for a far greater purpose. Together, we will restore Dalmasca to its proper place, and then I will stand at your side, loyal consort to the Dynast-Queen."

"You are not Rasler of Nabradia."

Is she doing aught else now, but trying to convince herself? He smiles, so gently, looking up at her. They have been here before.

"You would never know it. Before long, all this would seem no more real than a passing fancy, a meaningless dream that we had ever been parted. I would be such a husband to you, Ashe."

"W-what…" Ashe says, and swallows hard, each word taking all her strength to pull free, and she might be desperate and disloyal and alone but she is not such a fool to believe him. "What do you want in return?"

No tales of this end well for princesses, not a single one. He will want her soul, or the soul of her firstborn. He will ask for her absolute obedience, or perhaps dangle a silver sword above the throne, to take a limb each time she tells a lie. This spirit must want some obscene payment, in return for all her dreams.

He laughs, richly, and it floods through her like a river warmed by the sun.

"I want to _live_, Ashe." Need and hunger bleed through the familiar tone, turning it strange. A glimpse of truth through the illusion. Rasler never wished for anything so fiercely. "I want to walk in the world again. I want only to love you."

"That can't be…"

"I ask nothing you do not wish to give. I will make you the sword to shatter that of Solidor, to cut down the Consul where he stands. You will break the back of proud Archades, and the world will know peace as it has not known in a thousand years." His voice lowers, hands hovering over her still-clasped hands as if he would give anything to cross the barrier between them, to touch her for but a single moment. "Our children will walk this world as gods. You cannot imagine what I offer you."

It's all she can do not to gasp for air, and Ashe wants to shut her eyes, to retreat to darkness but that would mean looking away and he is not the man she loved, he isn't, but Rasler is gone and dead as the King her father is dead and she is alone. Is there a point in pretending she can cast aside an offer of aid, even one so impossible? If he did not look like Rasler, it might be easier to agree… but is that truly what she wants?

He smiles, as if he can hear those thoughts, as if he knows how little he needs to press his advantage.

"Wish for me to stay. Tell me that I must never leave your side."

"I… I don't…"

Noises come from the hall, the sound of footsteps outside the door and Rasler's image flickers violently as he rises quickly to his feet. Ashe moves with him, a spike of panic through her heart that only pierces deeper when he looks back to her and there is nothing but fear and worry and sorrow in his eyes.

"They are going to hurt you, Ashe, and I can't stop them."

"Wait! Please! Please-" Ashe steps forward, reaching for him, all thoughts of real or unreal lost against the pain of seeing Rasler vanish again, of being alone in an empty Archadian cell - but he is gone, as if he had never been.

The door opens, Vossler lifting the faceplate on the stolen helm even as he steps into the room, his expression tense and alert, too noble for anything so base as panic even though it's clear he expects an alarm to ring out at any moment.

"My lady. Faram the father bless us, that you are safe. We must make haste."

Ashe is seized for a moment by the absurd desire to order Vossler to leave her, so that Rasler might return. Whatever he is, he offered power, and even if his terms are false, even if the price _is_ her soul - just imagine it. Imagine Archadia trembling before her, throwing men and ships and all their might and deception against a power no augury could portend, their great armies scattered and broken at her feet. As Ashe had witnessed the end of all she loved.

Justice against those who deserve it most, and the return of her kingdom to glory. Name a price not worth the paying.

"Highness?" An edge of worry in Vossler's tone. "You are unharmed?"

"I'm fine." Ashe says, glancing from corner to corner of the empty room, no sign that she hasn't been alone all this time. She fights back a shudder. "Let us quit this place at once."


	38. a conspiracy of cartographers 2

The pleasure palaces of the Levantian Assembly hang like loosely strung beads in the skies between Rozarria's northern border and Archadia's western edge. Gracious hosts to all and beholden to none, they are a veritable Balfonheim of the skies. A fleet ripe with vices to be discovered, courted and indulged, the ships so lavishly adorned that they can blind unwary pilots caught in the glare on sunny days. At night, they glitter brightly enough to outshine the stars.

The ships are in constant competition with their fellows, each more lavishly appointed than the last. The _Harmattan_ has its own racing track for skybikes twining in and around its heights, and a high wire act in between the buildings, nothing but a slender rope between the performers and the sea glittering far below. The _Pampero _contains a menagerie of wild beasts from all the corners of Ivalice, and detailed replicas of fantastic treasures from across the ages.

The _Mistral _is, at least for the moment, the most elegant and exclusive casino, with a terraced path of floors pressed with golden, shining murals, leading up to a selection of private decks for those with the means or the nerve for the most spectacular bids. Waterfalls spill from hidden mechanisms on the walls surrounding the gaming tables, with flowers bursting from every pillar and post, a hanging garden in midair. All the dealers at the highest tables are viera, hired for the season at some surely absurd cost, adding a particular air of elegance and refinement to the already stunning surroundings.

It's the perfect place, really, to be down a quarter of a million gil.

Al-Cid slowly flips up one card and then the next, a few extra seconds only delaying the inevitable, and the viera moves with dispassionate precision, scooping away another fifty-thousand of his gil with a sweep of her hand.

"So much for that Rozarrian luck, eh?" Lord Courtenay winces sympathetically, even as a few chips are added to his own pile, one that's been casually growing for the last hour or so. At his side, Lia does not sigh or shift in her chair, though Al-Cid is beginning to bruise where she keeps discreetly kicking him under the table for every poor hand. No doubt she is comparing his luck to her own, stuck here being ogled by men who prefer money to manners when she could be off on any number of more exciting tasks. Al-Cid does wonder how Rosaline is getting along - and he can pretend that the moment's distraction is what costs him another ten-thousand gil, but there's little point to it.

Lia's next kick lands perfectly in line with the last, astonishingly painful for the space she has to work with and Al-Cid shifts in his chair to at least provide her with a fresh limb to aim for.

Any noble worth glancing at in the _Levantian_ has an entourage, though few are quite as openly shameless as Al-Cid is, the lovely faces and matching outfits of his 'Four Roses' still noteworthy even amidst this splendor, with at least one of the girls is attached to him at all times. The suggestion is that they are his bodyguards, though that rarely comes without a laugh - to guard him from what? The bartender and the dancing girls? The tables where he sees fit to squander the family fortune?

Al-Cid is embarrassing at roulette, humiliated by dice, and there was a moogle game with small, colored stones where he could have simply handed his money across the table to the same result. The kindest thought is that the Queen dotes on her youngest son. The less complimentary is that he stands entirely unfit for any more noble purpose.

If he were the sort of ambitious man who craved respect, if it grated that he was not seen as a man of power - the tenth son, with five princes and four princesses between himself and the throne - his life would be unbearable indeed.

His mother does hold him in her favor, true, but the Queen has never had much use for that which is not useful. He is neither being groomed for the throne or handsomely wedded or engaged in some venture of industry - Al-Cid is ridiculous and absurd, which makes him harmless - which means no one expects more from him, or notices except to laugh. He may throw around large sums of money as he likes, and no one pays much attention to just where his coin lands.

His Roses are treated as empty-headed ornaments, when they were hand-picked by the Queen for a rather exceptional range of skills. If they had other names before they'd pledged their service to the throne, he does not know them. It is in the best interests of all involved if he stays foolish, providing the excuse and the cover for the girls to do their work while he makes a proper distraction of himself.

He will admit, it is hardly taxing to suffer through extravagance, good food and wine and occasionally quite lovely company. Al-Cid is unsure of just what would happen, if he suddenly developed an untimely sense of ego, and was deemed a threat to the throne. He likes to think, after all their time together, that his beautiful Roses would at least give him a few minutes' head start.

The rich and important are as like as anyone to have their share of ridiculous children, those too far down the line of succession to ever be properly attended to, yet too wealthy to think of any proper profession. There are as many Archadian faces here as those from his own empire, the debauched and demanding children of Bhujerba and Dalmasca and even those few of Nabradia with new homes on distant shores. Wealth erases such silly concerns as borders and allegiances, and he has gained quite a few secrets without even asking, from the daughters of Archadian generals seeking to impress him, to scandalize him or in a moment's rebellion against the family bonds. The lesser sons of the greatest men in Archades will spill secrets as avidly as thousand-gil wine across the floor, toasting to the gods of wine and song alongside Al-Cid Margrace, the tenth son, the useless heir.

He has served his country quite well, in his own way.

"Oh, dear gods Margrace, look out below." Courtenay laughs, flipping over his hand. The house wins, and yet another hefty cut of the Rozarrian budget finds itself in their possession. Lia's kick seems more out of habit than actual malice, while she sips at her drink with an affected boredom that is truly not all that affected.

At times the best way to tell his girls apart is how they hurt him - Lia and Rosaline preferring immediate and subtle retaliation while Vidonia will bide her time, and punch him once they're behind closed doors. Dulcina has never punished him, which is to his benefit, Al-Cid only vaguely curious If there'd be enough of him left to apologize.

A moogle appears, with yet another bottle of wine, and Courtenay eagerly waves him forward. It has not escaped Al-Cid's notice that, despite his string of good luck, the Lord is more than a little in his cups. Courtenay is not one of his informers, unwitting or otherwise. He hails from a high Archadian house, but not one of particular interest to the Rozarrian crown. He is one of the few who seems quite aware that Al-Cid's uselessness is paired with a fair measure of opportunity, but if anything he treats it as a private joke, and they have always found reasons to be friends.

"You're in high spirits today, my friend." Al-Cid says, and Courtenay laughs, swirling the wine in his glass with what almost seems a nervous air.

"Oh, didn't I mention? We're celebrating! You're no longer looking at the greatest card sharp aboard this floating jeweled codpiece, but a man far improved." He throws his arms out, extravagantly. "Behold, my gentle lord, the newest petty officer and makeshift ballast aboard His Imperial Majesty's Inestimable and Remarkably Cramped Light Cruiser - the _Shiva_. Gods help us all."

"You're telling me you signed on?" he laughs, as Courtenay shakes his head in weary dismay.

"Despite all my best attempts at incompetence, Father went and purchased a commission. I can't imagine what that must have cost I had thought the shield of three brothers already in service to our esteemed country would be enough to spare me, but it seems it is not to be. At least Caris has the decency to be aboard the _Leviathan_, so I might run into him only when he wishes to measure against my inadequacies." Courtenay frowns, tugging at a bit of his long hair only to stare at it pensively. "They're going to make me cut it, you know. I actually _like_ my hair."

A vow of service is practically the kiss of death among the young Archadians of his acquaintance, trading a life of wine and women for eternal duty and obligation. Certainly, the Rozarrian Armada is no place Al-Cid ever wants to be but Archades treats its army like the sole calling from their true god. If a man should fail as a soldier, obviously he has failed as a man.

"The _Shiva_ is a good position, at least." The smaller crafts and ground troops suffer as they always have, but no one has ever actually sunk an Imperial cruiser in any engagement, they are truly built to last.

"Ah yes, my new life in a tin can, telling all the other little tin cans to stay in line. Margrace, I tell you, I can hardly wait."

"I cannot imagine how being paid to look the other way could possibly work in your favor." Al-Cid smirks, and Courtenay looks a bit relieved even as he frowns back. It strikes him that he might be the first one to know of this, that Courtenay has waited to tell him first. How strange it is, having enemies for friends.

"Don't you start making the best of things now, or I'll never get through this bottle."

The viera keeps dealing. Courtenay keeps drinking. Al-Cid manages to take a few paltry hands, but for the most part it continues to be an utter debacle. Courtenay wins enough that he wonders how much it might take to buy himself back to freedom, but they both know he'd never truly dodge his fate. Even here at the margins of social obligation, there are orders that cannot be denied. If the Queen summoned him into such service, Al-Cid might doubt her faith in him - along with her good judgement - but he would not run.

"I suppose it is as good a place as any to wait out this ridiculous war. You know, we ought to put something down, for the end of all this." Courtenay says, and he's no longer smiling quite so brightly. "Whichever one of us wins, he owes the other a drink."

"Should that not be the other way around?" Al-Cid laughs lightly. "Besides, I do not think it will be as bad as all that."

Courtenay looks at him soberly.

"But why else are you here?"

The situation has been tense for years, ever since Archadia moved on Nabradia and took Dalmasca, since Nabudis - and there is still no clear measure of Nabudis, whether it stands as a mark of sheer Archadian brutality or only that none of them are truly in control.

All that matters now is that on the very day that Vayne Solidor became Lord Consul, the _Alexander_ made its first successful flight across the Nam-Yensa Sandsea, sailing straight over the Jagd sands and stopping a mere fifty miles from the Rozarrian border. The largest, most powerful ship in the Archadian fleet can now go anywhere it wishes, and has thrown into stark relief just how much of Rozarria has been protected by nothing but sand and stone.

The Queen stands opposed to escalation now more than ever, making only those advances that they must to counter the Archadians. She is determined that if it be war, it will not be Rozarria to draw first blood, though such prudence has cost her in the court. Al-Cid has heard the mutters of discontent, suggestions of weakness and cowardice and even more pointed threats, that it is only a matter of time before one fleet or another takes matters into their own hands. One volley, one mistake - the whole border waits for that first shot like a runner at the starting gate.

The Rozarrian Empire does not have a history of stability - if anything, the threat of the Archadians have kept them united when they might have wished otherwise, but the calls to action now are downright frantic, demanding a swift and furious first response.

Al-Cid can see the sense in it, that if Archadia is not stopped here and now there may be nothing left that can, but those who shout the loudest and ask for the most also have no clear end in sight. No border drawn, where Archadia must be pushed back to ensure their security. No clear measure of what will happen, when the Archadians surely match such aggression with their own. The Empires have territory between them that has been in dispute for centuries - there will never be an outcome fully in Rozarria's favor, which means only a never-ending war in the service of those with their eye on the throne.

The Rozarrian Empire could endure such a foolish bloodletting, but the line of Margrace will not survive.

"My apologies, I've gone and spoiled the mood." Courtenay says.

"No, not at all." Al-Cid says, throwing down another losing hand. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Vidonia stroll by on the deck below, taking no notice of him, though her presence is the sign that Rosaline has finished with her work. "As the table proves, I am capable of doing that all on my own. It may be prudent that I retire, though. Otherwise I might find myself conscripted, and aiming at you from the other side of the clouds."

"As you say, I am sure you'd find a way to make it work in your favor." The Archadian smiles, but there's a sadness in it too - this is goodbye, and for who knows how long. "Take care of yourself, Margrace. You know I live to see you lose your shirt at the tables."

"You and every lady from here to the coast." Margrace says, but the words are empty foolishness and they both know it- all a script they must follow even as the shiftless sons of privilege, and even if the ending satisfies no one. "Be safe, my friend."

The Queen keeps an apartment in the penthouse at the _Pampero, _though she herself has never visited,and when Al-Cid arrives Vidonia and Rosaline are already there. The former tosses him a bag loaded down with chips while the latter is reclined on the sofa, glaring with real venom at a piece of crystal on the table. Rosaline has a bevy of scientific accreditation from the most prestigious institutions in the Rozarrian capital, and is almost certainly the smartest person within a hundred miles of the Assembly.

"Worthless junk. The whole stash, little more than ballast."

Al-Cid had hardly bothered to get his hopes up, but the disappointment stings even so. It is not the first time an ambitious man has claimed to be dealing in Nethicite, nor the first time Rosaline has proved otherwise. A spiteful part of him hopes the man might still attempt to prove his product, sail the Jagd with his crates full of nothing and clear the skies of one more fool. The Queen will not be pleased, this had been a more promising lead than the last, but Nethicite continues to act as a phantom thorn in their side, impossible to ignore but just as impossible to possess.

"At least I stole his cufflinks" Rosaline says, letting them clink across the tabletop. Tiny golden cactuars with diamond eyes. The perfect trophy for such a waste of time and coin. "So how much did you lose?"

Lia makes a very impolite sound, and Al-Cid ignores her, preferring to count out Vidonia's spoils instead, letting the chips spill across the tabletop. The girl truly has a knack for victory.

"You know," Rosaline says, "you _can_ maintain your cover without losing every gil in the royal coffers. Your Highness."

"I have heard as much. Where is Dulcina?"

"Gathering information at the _Harmattan_, for whatever that's worth." Vidonia says. "It's not like we don't know what's going on out there, there's just nothing we can do about it."

It's been little more than a week since Vayne Soldior became Lord Consul of Rabanastre, and all of Al-Cid's Resistance connections have already dried up, anyone not killed or imprisoned during the ill-fated attack on the Palace no longer so certain that revolt is worth the trouble. It's difficult to encourage an uprising, with the memory of the _Ifrit_ still hanging overhead, and Al-Cid never had much to offer them in the way of formal support to begin with. It had been a matter of causing annoyance more than any real change, throwing money in to keep the Archadians busy with chasing rebels rather than working to lock down their borders.

He has all but abandoned the endeavor, useful enough with two years of instability but with Vayne Solidor in command - the man is a bastard, but an inconveniently competent one. Archadia has two faces, the soldier to tear down the world and the bureaucrat to remake it in an Imperial facade. Vayne keeps his faculty in the former somewhat hidden, but he is an open master of the latter.

Al-Cid can hardly blame Dalmasca, already with their fill of being caught in the middle. The best that he could ever offer them was a chance to rise up against Archadian tyranny, not so much the actions of a Lord Consul whose measures are mild, measured and even conciliatory. The Nabradians never really trusted him, and the Dalmascans even less so - for all Al-Cid had funneled money and resources to the rebels, he'd never gained entrance into their inner circle.

He has often cursed himself for a fool, a stupid boy too young to take heed of the opportunities to accompany the ambassadors to Rabanastre, long before the war. He thought there'd been no reason to care for a princess bound to another, from a small country of no real consequence, but since her apparent death Princess Ashelia has been all but deified, and Dalmasca has proven to be of rather more than consequence. If only they had trusted him, if only he had found her before the Archadians did.

"So what do we do now?" Lia says. "Back to the border?"

"No." Al-Cid shakes his head. "I believe the Queen will recall us to the West, to determine which of our own ships she ought to keep the closest watch on."

"It's not going to stop them." Rosaline says.

Of course it won't. Al-Cid knows the tale of what Raminas was hiding, although it's difficult to believe he could have such a power and still allow his country to be overrun. It's hard to believe the rumors, that the Archadians not only have the princess but the Dusk Shard as well - and once that becomes common knowledge, with the spectre of Nabudis still so fresh even the Queen will not be able to keep the fleets from moving

Al-Cid has met with his sisters and brothers in this very apartment, with their families in tow on holidays; for birthdays and engagements and excited announcements of a new addition to the line of Margrace. He cannot begin to count the cousins and nieces and nephews who are attached in some way to the Armada. For all his supposed skill at intrigue, Al-Cid does not know which of them will be in the most danger, or where the worst blow will fall. At the moment he lacks any interest in pretending his failings are at all charming, that he is anything other than impatient with himself.

The door clicks open quietly, Dulcina entering the room, and she waits until it closes behind her to speak.

"Ondore has the princess. Ashelia of Dalmasca is no longer in Archadian hands."

He has asked before, how she comes to know all she does, but Dulcina has told him he might either learn what she knows or how she knows it - and whatever her methods, she has never been wrong.

Al-Cid himself has pressed the point to Ondore that Bhujerba is strong enough to stand on its own, but the Marquis has always demanded more protection than Rozarria could give no way for the Empire to help them with an open rebellion and still remain neutral against Archadia. It is quite a drastic move for him to suddenly give shelter to a rebel princess, and the bonds of family were never enough to move the Marquis before now. What has changed? What does he know, that they do not?

As if Al-Cid does not know the whispers at the edges of so many conversations, words too much like fairy tales to speak aloud. The Dusk Shard. The Dawn Shard. _The Sun-Cryst_.

"He'll need us to take the princess." Lia says. "Ondore's got nowhere else to put her - she has to come to Rozarria."

If he plays this correctly, it might very well prove his chance to make up for at least a few of the foolish oversights of his youth. It's been said that Ashelia of Dalmasca is quite lovely indeed.

Al-Cid expects Dulcina to elaborate on her news, but instead the girl is reading over a short letter, and when he moves to ask her what it is she hands him the envelope instead. He is left staring at a very familiar crest that leaves him wondering just how many bottles of wine they'd actually managed to kill at the tables. The girls pass the note to each other as he tries and fails to look over their shoulders.

"How did you even get this?"

"Hand-delivered. The courier was definitely from his retinue."

"It's not real."

"It's meaningless even if it is."

"I would say it's a forgery, but what would be the point?"

Al-Cid listens to the girls argue back and forth, while the winding serpents on the seal seem to look back at him in a wordless challenge.

"So, we finally gain a formal acknowledgement from House Solidor? Fortune shines on us this day."

Strange as it is for the heir to the Archadian throne to be sent about like any other son, he has met Vayne out in the world, the both of them playing border games through the proxies of proxies. Vayne is aware of his interest in Dalmasca and in the Nethicite, but this is the first time he's actually bothered to call him out.

Finally, the note is passed over to his hands, and what is already baffling makes even less sense the longer he looks. Al-Cid is simply not important enough for this sort of intrigue. Certainly, his death would not go unmourned or unavenged, were he to be drawn into some kind of trap and assassinated, but it would not stir the empire to any great foolish action. Archadia is nowhere near as clever as they believe themselves to be, if they wish this to tangle him in some intrigue, and by it implicate the Queen. His mother has always stood happily by to disavow all knowledge of his behavior, should a scandal threaten to tarnish her throne.

Yet what else is to be had in a letter from Lord Larsa Soldior?

The note is plain, not of their usual over-elaborate style, and almost certainly penned in the young lord's own hand. Larsa seeks a meeting, private and clandestine, to speak of peace. Of all things, to find an accord between their empires that might prevent the war. It seems he is finally stepping out of the shadow of his elder brother - and that a long shadow, indeed.

At the surface, it seems no less than a fool's errand. Peace at this late stage is like to be all but impossible, too many men with too much to gain to bother with a reasoned response. Larsa Solidor is a child, even if he is the favorite of the court he wields no real power - but these are all the arguments of a man with something to lose. Al-Cid has always been meant to chase after subtle rumors and foolish possibilities. It is no less than the bidding of the Crown that he reach for the impossible. Even if the boy cannot meet his most ambitious goals, Larsa is still second in line for the Archadian throne and only a true fool would ignore such an opportunity.

"On what neutral ground does our noble lord wish to meet?"

If the girls are at all surprised, it only lasts a moment, although they are far from enthusiastic.

Lia frowns. "He can't possibly have the authority…"

"Well, then we have much in common." Al-Cid says, and smiles.


	39. a conspiracy of cartographers 3

_Measure against eternity._

It is the motto of House Solidor, penned by a surprisingly prescient ancestor. Vayne has always admired it, not a boast or a challenge against other Houses but a warning to its members. He thinks that he has never felt its full meaning quite as well as now, with looming apocalypse in one hand and a city's worth of paperwork in the other.

The reward for competence, his desk creaking as well as it ever did in Archades beneath the weight of purpose and expectation. The moogles have already been in and out with a small cart once this morning, and there will be a return trip before the day is out.

The initial internal audit has come up rather as he expected, with a considerable amount of money missing and everyone pointing to everyone else. It's rather amazing they thought they could get away with it all, considering the relative paucity of funds trickling into Dalmasca since the war. Still, it would be the sort of business that might have been overlooked entirely save that the new Lord Consul is also the Imperial heir, which makes this not only embezzlement but treason - punishable by death - which likely explains why two of the lords did not even bother showing up to the meeting, and are likely no longer in Dalmasca.

A shame he has so much to attend to at present - it would be quite amusing to play at politics with the Baron and his little band of merchant lords, when just addressing them each by name had been enough to make a few of them balk. It certainly seems to unnerve them, how much their new Lord Consul is already aware of the situation in Rabanastre. Taneli had proven himself a rather invaluable resource on that front, providing a counterpoint to their claims of what could and could not be done, and quite gleefully prepared to let the air out of every overinflated price set by the Marshals for their services.

Vayne has let Cid have at him, to test the artificer's true skill, and their first meeting had lasted long after sundown and wore out two servants rushing back and forth with books and paperwork. The path forward all depends on what Rabanastre is capable of building on its own, if they can produce the bulk of the raw materials Cid demands, and do so to Archadian standards. The Doctor says maybe. Taneli says absolutely, and has done his part to rally his allies ever since.

Vayne has allowed the Marshals an oversight committee - it will pacify them, and run check on the Rabanastrian artificers, just in case, though Vayne does not see further problems from that quarter. The Marshals are fighting the skybike races already, breathlessly opposed to what they claim will be nothing but a dozen high-speed missiles pointed at the palace itself, no matter how distant from Rabanastre the track is set. Vayne will see that bill pass, though, if he has to get behind it and shove.

In a smaller pile perch his missives from home, the Emperor's official correspondences. Word of his impromptu venture out into the markets has reached His Grace - the first note came swiftly, chiding him for such rash and dangerous behavior, an unsubtle warning toward setting a good example for his brother. A reminder, one of several such he's received so far, that Larsa should never have come to Dalmasca, that he has been long expected back home.

Vayne ignores each of them, certain the Emperor will not be surprised. Only one more routine, another game they play. His brother sails with the dawn, and that will have to satisfy.

A map falls to the floor as he moves for another stack of papers, and Vayne scoops it up, wondering if it is still current for being less than a day old. The latest movements of Rozarria's fleets span its surface, of increasing interest with the border now nearly at the palace door. Vayne does not think they will try for Dalmasca, though perhaps not out of fear of retaliation so much as the strategic value of not destroying the homeland of a newly resurrected princess. The Queen must know of the girl's revival by now, no doubt dispatching some subtle agent - perhaps her youngest, scraped once more from the floor of some unfortunate boudoir and shoved in the direction of the prize.

The thought of Balthier squaring off against the formidable absurdity that is Al-Cid Margrace has Vayne smiling through the driest of accounts and ledgers. Margrace is a clever fool, quite adept at hiding his successes, with what seems an endless supply of the famed Rozarrian luck to keep him afloat when his skill seems fit to fail him. The two of them will no doubt be as friendly as a pair of coeurls in a tied-up sack.

At the corner of his eye, a shadow flits past. A flutter of sound, and a tiny bird lands at the edge of his desk. Its head is cocked, a beady eye staring at him, or more likely, the better part of his breakfast, an orange cake currently holding down a pile of tax codes. Vayne has seen them around the palace, a common little creature but still a very pretty yellow, cautious and fearless in turn as it hops closer. He does not move, and it moves closer still, chirping at him boldly, aware of his attention.

"You know, you remind me of someone." He says softly, and the bird tenses slightly but does not fly away, the temptation of pastry obviously worth the risk of his company.

Larsa's little foundling is exactly as she'd explained herself, Penelo a war orphan who works for Migelo in his shop and - according to random chatter - is quite popular with the local merchants, well-known for her cheerfulness and hard work. Enough to have them throwing questions back at his courier, wondering why the Lord Consul was asking after a girl who'd never caused anyone trouble.

Penelo lives as a pauper in Lowtown with the boy, Vaan, who also works for Migelo, just as she'd said. Amazingly, neither of them seem to have any ties to the rebellion up to the night of the fete.

Vayne is never quite certain if he believes in coincidence, but there is enough evidence to render her guiltless in this, at least. If only the girl were still in Rabanastre. Migelo had stammered through some explanation to his courier - Penelo had gone away, out in the desert visiting old friends and making new deals. He couldn't reach her, or say when she might return.

Which meant Balthier had scooped her up the minute Vayne had let her go, perhaps wanting information or simply obeying the demands of chivalry, rescuing a poor girl from his wicked machinations. He will keep her safe, and should the situation change, Vayne can easily have Penelo detained as a person of interest, sent off to any number of secluded estates in Archadia until all of this has played itself out.

The bird pecks a bit at the edge of the cake, hopping away from Vayne's hand as he crumbles a bit of it into more useful crumbs. It quickly returns to eat its fill and chirps at him once more, before flying back out of the window that's really more like a missing wall, with a long, marble balustrade overlooking the large central courtyard.

Larsa is out there in spite of the sun, and has been working with a young blue hatchling for most of the morning, getting it used to the feel of the bit and the bridle. He is of a limitless patience, no matter how many times the saddle is thrown off into the dust or the bird nips at his fingers. The grooms and stable boys have quickly learned to yell at the center of the flock and wait for his brother's head to pop up from the middle. Larsa has also become quite popular with the maids and the serving girls, familiar giggles and whispers in his wake - and who knows what power plays are happening behind the scenes for who gets to set down his meals, or be the last to wish him good evening.

Vayne had wondered whether his brother might have simply discovered a preference for Rabanastrian girls, but all his smiles since have been nothing but polite. Only now and then has Vayne has caught him staring off into space, perched in any window in the palace with a glimpse over the far wall, into the city. A bit strange, that Larsa has not tried to sneak out, has not even complained about his confinement. Instead, there is only the occasional despondent sigh, his brother spending any time he's not in the stables idly turning the pages on one of the books of Dalmascan history from the palace's own libraries.

He doesn't know what's more amusing - his brother's utterly besotted state or that he seems to think no one else has noticed.

* * *

The slight shuffle of footsteps announces Cid a few moments before he appears, raising a hand full of papers in his direction in greeting, Vayne shaking an equal share back as his reply.

The Doctor has always stretched the capacity of 'I'll be right there,' though here in Rabanastre he lacks any proper lab to disappear into, little on the palace grounds to tempt him and too much security required to move elsewhere with ease. Despite abandoning both jacket and waistcoat he remains thoroughly unenthralled by the desert climate, seeking shelter in any cool alcove. Vayne has tried to accommodate him, the air chilled in both Cid's quarters and this study to what is almost bitter, though he still collapses into the nearest chair with a look of resigned dismay.

"There is not enough ice magicite in the _world_."

"You could ask them to hang the sun a bit higher."

"You're the Consul. Pass a law." Cid grumbles, and it's surprising he reaches for the water pitcher and actually bothers with the glass, instead of just pouring it directly over his head.

"The Senate's repealed Draklor's quarterly increase. I believe I'll ask for it back, as part of the initial reparations for Dalmasca."

The moment he'd known he was to leave Archades, Vayne had seeded his work with projects specifically for the Senate to waste their time dismantling. It will buy perhaps half a year, before they make their first real strike at Draklor itself, but by then… well, one way or another they will likely be playing an entirely different game.

Cid does not answer him, or break the growing silence, and there is little point in asking what is wrong. They have not spoken of Vayne's little revelation since that first day, though no doubt it weighs as heavily on his mind. Ashelia of Dalmasca will trust her uncle, the kindly Marquis of Bhujerba. She believes Vayne is the only liar she needs to tear from a stolen throne, the only villain to defeat - thank all the gods that Balthier knows better.

"What do you suppose they want? The final victory of the Occuria." Cid finally says, quietly. "Venat never spoke on it."

"I do not flatter myself with thinking I might know the answer. Whatever their desire, we are all no more than sheep to be culled, and it has been so for a very long time."

Vayne wonders more why Venat had shifted sides in the first place. Without the Nethicite, things would likely have proceeded to roughly the same end - eventually they would have taken Dalmasca, even Nabudis may have been lost - but with only the Princess to learn of her destiny. If it had not been her, then perhaps her child, or an entirely new heir to their ambitions - the Occuria could certainly wait as long as it required, with the rest of the world shuffling along in blind ignorance. Venat would have shared in that great victory - what had swayed its judgement so?

"There is, of course, the matter of the treaty blade. I wish Raithwall had thought to mention that. If the sword I created shattered at Nabudis, another of its make will prove equally useless, and even at the best of Venat's instruction I could not improve upon it. There is little use in finding the Sun-Cryst if we cannot rid ourselves of it."

"The Sword of Kings is yet in the world, is is not?"

"Yes, but as well hidden as it ever was, and we now lack any sort of guide." Cid chuckles. "Or mayhap the Occuria will simply hand it over, if the girl should ask?"

"Who knows? I would hope Her Highness might demand some proof of confidence, before giving herself over fully to their cause. We must be ready, and patient, and see what comes of it."

"You don't have time for patience."

An unexpected tightness, almost anger in Cid's voice, though his eyes are still firmly fixed on his notes.

"Have I offended you somehow, Doctor?"

"It is _real_, the Sun-Cryst. I have to keep reminding myself - I hardly thought you believed me, for years. I didn't truly believe it myself. The power to change the world - and you do not seem all that concerned in obtaining the key to its possession."

"A key that would gladly undo us all."

"-and if it were not her choice to make?"

Ah, now it becomes clear. No, Cid. No, not this. Not for him.

"You would see me make a bid for godhood?"

"I would see you _live_, Vayne." Cid says softly. "I am not as quick to be done with you as you are to quit the world."

As if Vayne wishes to die. As if that is at all the point.

"I am no innocent, to wonder at my fate." He says. "I admit, it is inopportune, but it is hardly unfair."

"Nonsense." Cid says, with more force than anyone has ever spent in his defense. Vayne is still amazed that he is not alone in this, when he had assumed it would certainly be so. Maybe this is how it had been for Venat, some imperceptible shift, the unexpected understanding it did not wish to deny. One day when it realized it had come to care more than it should for the creatures under its watch, and that the price of victory was higher than it could pay.

"If I think for a moment to gamble for my life against the world, we will lose _everything_. If I clutch and grab for every breath - you have seen that path, you know where it ends. It sits on the throne even now. Do not ask me to be that, Doctor. I cannot."

Cid knows. He is of Archades, he has seen ambition and desperation and foolish undoings - but he is also every inch as stubborn as his pirate son. Vayne will have to take care, lest the Doctor risk himself on some foolish plan of his own.

"I have not given up on you yet."

Vayne smiles. "Foolish old man."

"Idiot boy."

* * *

The room is quiet enough for the Judge Magister's approach to carry easily, and Vayne swears he can hear the coiled anger in each step. In truth, he has never known Gabranth to be otherwise, and he does not think it changes so much when the Judge Magister is out of his presence. A glance outside reveals Larsa still hard at work, close enough to keep an eye on - which means Gabranth has found out about Nalbina.

The man moves with swift precision, unnervingly fast, not at all encumbered by his armor. Vayne is always reminded of one of Cid's scientific marvels, a spark along the right seam of stone underground leading to a wildfire that never shows itself. On the surface, all is calm, but beneath there is only an endless molten roar.

"I would speak with you, Lord Consul."

It is laughably far from a request.

"Doctor, if you would give us a moment?"

Cid rolls his eyes, gathering the papers strewn around him as he gets up slowly from the chair. The Judge Magister keeps his eyes forward, and says nothing. Gabranth believes the Doctor is a dangerous lunatic. Cid is certain the Judge would run him through without the slightest hesitation. Vayne thinks one of these is slightly more true than the other.

The door shuts behind him, and the only sound that remains is the distant plinking of water in the fountain, and Larsa whistling out a command, or laughing when it does not go as planned. Vayne sees no reason to even attempt at politeness.

"You did not tell me."

"It seems I did not need to."

For a moment, he wonders if the Judge Magister is going to punch his desk - or through it.

"Send me after him."

"You already have your duty, Gabranth. This is not it."

Vayne swears he can almost hear the metal plate shiver with the force of the Judge Magister's rage.

"He will ruin you."

"You believe he will speak?" Vayne says. "And say what? Who will listen? The only ones who do not know exactly what took place are those who profit from their ignorance. An example was made of Basch fon Rosenberg, and the world let it happen."

He reminds himself to pen the Marquis a thank-you note, for looking after Larsa during his visit. He does not doubt Ondore knows how closely he is being watched, but a gracious reminder costs little more than time.

"The people…"

"The people of Dalmasca will do as the people are told to do. Tragic though it may be, a man's morals rarely extend further than his own comforts."

It is not the whole truth of the matter, but it serves better for the Judge Magister to believe Vayne at the fool's edge of arrogance.

"You promised me-"

"Gabranth, you are as vigilant as ten men, and yet you lost Larsa in Bhujerba." Vayne lets his voice fall with the force of a whip crack, to shatter the Judge's protest to dust. "Who would you have me set in your place? Bergan? Drace? Oh certainly, she would be the first to fall on her sword in disgrace, which would only deny me the small satisfaction of a proper punishment."

He has considered it, that this might be asking too much of the Judge Magister's obedience - but the fact that Gabranth is here and asking permission and not already hunting the Princess and her companions down is proof enough of where his true loyalties lie, and that Vayne had not been wrong in his choice all those years ago.

"Fon Rosenberg lives as a hunted man. Friendless, surrounded by all the reminders of his failure, with his only allies those who will use them for their own gain. The only paths before him are all likely to end in an unmarked grave - at best. I would hardly say he is free."

"The situation will only grow more dangerous by the day."

"Which is why you will stay exactly where you are. Are we understood, Gabranth?"

"… yes, your Grace."

* * *

"Oh, there you are!"

Larsa, windburned and sun-swept, has found his way to their window. A bit of clambering over the decorative carvings, and he's quickly inside and pouring himself a glass of water for each hand. As yet, there is no formal court for him to impress, hence his rolled-up pants and half-unbuttoned shirt, not to mention the sandals on his feet, likely borrowed from one of the stablehands. Give him another week, and Larsa would likely be indistinguishable from the next desert nomad.

"You're still not cross with him about Bhujerba, are you, Lord Brother?"

"No," Vayne says, "I am quite content to keep that blame with you."

"Good." Larsa half-collapses in the chair Cid had quit. Larsa tips his head back, gazing at the Judge Magister with a perfect, trusting innocence. "I hope I did not interrupt."

"Of course not, milord." Gabranth says, retreating without another word to the far side of the room. Unlikely they will have the opportunity to speak further, though Vayne has said all that he needs to, and at least for the short-term it seems the Judge Magister is, if not content, then at least willing to follow orders. Cid opens the door a few moments later, and quickly reestablishes himself at an empty side-table nearby.

Vayne turns his attention back to Larsa. "Well, what is your verdict?

"The palace flock is more diverse than I expected, and they keep quite impressive records. I believe a few of the birds are of Nabradian royal stock, which would make their breeding lines all but invaluable, though I haven't had as much time as I would like to-"

"I am sure room can be made for you to take your favorites along. Provided you leave me with something to ride."

It ought to make Larsa happy, but Vayne is not so surprised when he only nods, with the distant expression that has become his recent favorite.

"You seem preoccupied, brother. Is something amiss?"

Vayne could state it outright, but it is far more amusing to watch his brother struggle to bring the question out, all his usual skill with language utterly failing him now.

"Have you ever… I mean… if one wished to give a gift… not out of obligation, but to show one's esteem. I mean, that is…"

"Airship." Cid says, nonplussed as they stare at him. "What? It works."

"I have not… I suppose I should ask to see what sorts of gifts they give here in the city. Or perhaps… I do not wish it to be common, or she shall think I spent no time at all considering it. But… our flowers would wilt to nothing here, and confections melt and… maybe I am better off not making a fool of myself."

Larsa throws an arm over his eyes with all the weight of the world his age can provide, long enough for Cid to grin at Vayne over his shoulder. Let the rest of the world have their perfect prince, he will gladly take this brother as his own.

"I might suggest a visit to Archadia, if the lady in question lives abroad." He offers. "Certainly there are enough diversions there to choose from. Perhaps a trip to the theatre, or the ballet? A performance from the Royal Archadian Corps might show your esteem - that is, if this mystery woman is fond of dancing."

Larsa frowns at him, and Vayne looks back serenely, and he is just fast enough to catch the elaborately embroidered cushion aimed at his head.

"You do not need to me to tell you what you already know." Larsa says. "It is not even as if I wish… or that I think she would wish… and it is not… I have already considered two-dozen arguments for why any such thinking would be _ill-advised_."

He grinds the words out with difficulty - and there it is, the Solidor in him. Intolerant of idiocy for the sake of custom, of being denied for no better reason than the approval of others. He does not need the approval of others, it has never been their way to be defined by the world.

"The Court is unfond of outsiders, that is true." Vayne says. "Of course, they are just as often to dislike their neighbors. Attempting to please them is at best a necessary folly - but the throne of Archadia stands ever in the sun."

"Is that why you have never married?"

Their eldest brother - the first son, the heir - he had a wife, then a widow. Now a woman long remarried, living quietly with her family far away from Archades. Thankfully, neither of his brothers had produced any heirs, or perhaps Vayne might have been expected to deal with them as well.

"I have never found anyone whom I would wish to subject to my endless fits of pique."

Cid snorts softly from the corner.

"Penelo is… I have never met a girl like her, not in all the world. Her strength, her courage - she is so… bright. She _shines_. I believe I could learn a great deal from her, about this land and its people. I am certain of it, and… I have no expectations, otherwise."

If the girl does not love him yet, Vayne gives it another two meetings, maybe three at most. A matter of some difficulty, with Larsa in Archades, a thousand miles distant, but once she has taken up work in the palace, Vayne might petition on his brother's behalf.

"You care for her."

Larsa straightens, shoulders set with all the determination of a House that has outlived nations.

"I want to protect her. I wish… I wish to see her smile, always."

"You are asking, then, if I have some objection?"

He is, though Larsa does not wish to say it aloud. He already knows what Vayne might argue, what any other man would say in his place. The girl has no title, no legacy - no _money_, barely a person at all in the eyes of Archadia's most noble. Larsa is a fool for even considering her a friend, let alone more, and he shouldn't need an argument to persuade him against such folly. Vayne has met the girl, though, and Penelo is neither small nor common. The great Houses have never seen him rush to their defense, and he is certainly not going to start here.

"Does she make you happy?"

Larsa blushes, just a little, and glances away, and nods.

"Then what objection could I have?"

His brother's smile is hope. It is purpose. Everything in the world worth saving, all that is worthy and good in the curve of one throwaway grin. Vayne is not going to die, he will not diminish until he is certain that nothing remains to threaten what must be. Emperor Larsa Ferrinas Solidor.

Vayne plays the noble stoic with Cid, and yet here in these quiet moments he finds himself bargaining like any other fool, desperate to wrest a few more moments from indifferent fates. Gods, that he might live to see his brother crowned.

Time passes, Larsa with a book and Cid with his work, Gabranth standing silent vigil in the corner. Soon enough, his brother is napping in his chair, the book large enough to be a half-decent blanket, and even Cid laid low by the heat, head on his arms and snoring slightly. He'll regret napping in that chair when he wakes, but for the moment Vayne keeps quiet - he is responsible for too many of the man's sleepless nights to begrudge him now.

Vayne continues on through the interminable paperwork. Loren has proven himself every bit the competent bureaucrat, with a full set of dossiers at Vayne's disposal on those rebels currently in the limbo of Nalbina, the innocent and the guilty both, though it is little surprise that Loren seems to think there are more of the former. Vayne flips through an impressive amount of evidence, signed testimonies and reports from the families of those arrested claiming their innocence, perhaps with a bit more detail than is purely necessary.

It certainly earned Loren no love from the Judges to be so soft-hearted, but it will prove useful now. He signs half the pardons Loren has suggested - any more and there will certainly be an uproar, though if he waits a week or two he can dispatch with the rest while everyone is busy shouting over the next great scandal.

Vayne has been thinking on this next move ever since he met Taneli, and the shipwright spoke of the loss of Nalbina, of Rasler's death and the mistakes that led to it. There is little confidence in the power of this would-be Queen, and Vayne can do some work there. He will choose one more man from those in Loren's pile - a guilty man, as close to the Princess as he can find, and Vayne will free him and send him out with a note, to find its way to Ashelia and what is left of her advisors.

An offer of parlay, a kingdom ready for her rule if she will only hold fast with the Empire against Rozarria. He has no doubt the Princess will not accept - that she would die rather than accept - but perhaps there are those around her who might reconsider. Vayne has no pretense of dignity, not in this, not with all there is to lose. He will beg her, if it comes to it, on his knees with his throat bared for her blade. He will be kind, if she is compliant, or if he must Vayne will strip her of every support, turn every ally against her until she has nothing left but to look to him for mercy.

Larsa shifts a little in his sleep, covered in dust, rumpled and smelling of bird and perfect. He is young yet, his hair hanging long enough to soften his features further, but he will quite soon be of age. A great celebration in Archades, they are no doubt already starting to make the arrangements.

_Do you remember it, Gramis? The year I turned sixteen?_

He never thought there could be a year to match it, and yet here they are.


	40. a conspiracy of cartographers 4

"I did not know the viera were thieves."

It's the first thing that Ashelia of Dalmasca says to her. The only thing, in a moment's pause beneath the streets of Rabanastre, and she does not wait for a reply. Many humes believe viera cannot lie, though Fran can tangle truths as well as any other. Truly, it is not a skill of much use in the Wood, and Fran thinks this princess might have been happier had she been born to that world instead of this one.

In Ashelia's gaze and her defiance and all the silence that follows, Fran sees nothing so clearly as Jote at her most unsure. It reminds her of the moment that her sister realized she had no intention of joining the Elders, that she meant meant to quit the Wood entire. A vast silence had spilled out between them then, like a river rushing over its banks, destroying any sign of what had been before. An anger as punishing to one who carried it as to its target. Ashelia sits in that same pale space now, distant and untouchable.

Jote was caring, and kind in her quiet way, but could not allow herself to show weakness. Responsibility had made her even more cautious and stern. She could not suffer the thought of failure, as this princess cannot, and though Ashelia had been ready to risk herself for their sake in Rabanastre, she does not know how to be strong without being cold. Fran would not take offense, even if it weren't so obvious that the girl judges no one as harshly as herself.

Eryut had little use for princesses or queens, but Fran understands loyalty and fealty, what it is beyond even honor that keeps Basch fon Ronsenberg here, when Ashelia has said as little to him, and will not look him in the eye. His long imprisonment had not parted him from his wits or his skills, but when the fighting ends he keeps to long silences, deferent and unfailingly polite when not lost in his own thoughts. He no longer smells of stone or small, dark spaces - only very faintly of blood, some slight nick from shaving away two years with trembling hands.

The room they have settled in is quite like one of Balthier's oft-spoken stages, some odd and comic farce with all the scripts cast aside. A grand estate in some distant past, now a mansion quietly crumbling away on one of Bhujerba's lesser islands, no doubt often used for the Marquis' less exemplary business. Much of the furniture has been stripped from the lesser rooms, with cracks in the windowpanes and spiderwebs catching dust on the shelves, all the gardens well overgrown. No sign of servants, but the room had been awaiting their arrival, the wide central table well-stocked with provisions. Balthier immediately uncorked the best bottle he could find, lounging back in the most comfortable chair with the occasional comment about a reward she know he never expects to see.

Nothing had gone as planned even by their usual, generous definition of plan, and it remains to be seen what will happen next, this strange tale of improvising players bound by nothing but a tangle of common cause.

Balthier would prefer not to be here at all. It speaks in every line of his body beneath the feigned indifference. It is rarely comfortable for a sky pirate to be an invited guest, let alone waiting on a man like the Marquis. Ondore is no ally of Archadia or Rozarria but that hardly puts him on their side.

"You and Basch-" Vaan says from around a mouthful of meat, until Penelo punches him on the shoulder and he pauses long enough to swallow. "You've known each other a long time, right?"

The boy is the only one of them who seems not to notice the tension in the air, or he does and doesn't care, used to being the interloper that must take what he can while it's there. Vossler nods - he seems a serious sort of man, though not unkind. Weary, as they all certainly must be.

"We've been allies since before you were born." He turns to Balthier. "I understand that I have you to thank for his rescue, sky pirate. I am in your debt."

Balthier shrugs. "My curiosity got the better of me, though with a Judge Magister for an enemy, that cage yet might prove the safer place."

It had been a satisfying moment, two lost knights of a lost kingdom unexpectedly reunited, though Ashelia had gone stiff and still when Basch stepped into the room, with her hands in tight fists, fingers digging against her palms, her voice regal and unyielding as any proclamation of the kings of old.

"You didn't kill my father.

Basch met her eyes without flinching, for a long, deliberate moment before looking to the floor. "Yet I failed to protect him."

"As you failed to protect my husband."

"Yes."

Vossler had done his best to protest on both ends of that argument, to seemingly little good. Only Vaan had ever believed Basch to be truly guilty, and even then not for long, his pent-up fury quickly burning out with no fuel to catch the flame. Basch had accepted it all without protest, the boy's rebuke and his apology, the princess' judgment and her silence. As he'd gone to one knee and sworn an oath that had never been broken in the first place.

Basch is a man with a core of steel, and she in desperate need of such steadfast loyalty - yet here they are, and Ashelia will not look at him, let alone give him any measure of peace.

"You never knew he had a brother?" Balthier asks, and Vossler shakes his head. Basch clears his throat, his voice still rough after so much time in isolation.

"I believed him dead, many years ago - just after I had left for Rabanastre. If I had known… there was word, of course, of a Gabranth in the court, but our mother had many brothers and sisters who shared the name. Noah and I were half of Landis blood, barely noble by the standards of Archadia. I had never imagined that he might, I never thought… and I still do not understand why."

"Choose the proper betrayal, and stand at the right hand of the heir to the throne." Balthier suggests.

Basch's barely nods. "It is as you say."

The footsteps moving down the hall toward them are from but one man, unarmored. Balthier has learned to take his cues from Fran in this - when she glances to the door his eyes follow hers, but she has not tensed and so he keeps his hand from his pistol, preferring a swig of wine as the Marquis Ondore steps into the room.

"… Uncle Halim?"

It cannot be what Ashelia intends, the slight, startled waver in her voice, the way she is up and out of her chair but not quite moving toward him. Balthier does not trust the Marquis, indeed there is little reason to - but Fran thinks that at least for one moment he is just a man, with a niece he had not ever expected to see alive. Ondore goes to her without hesitation, his hands around hers, as close to an unguarded moment as he may be capable of.

"Your Majesty. It is good to see you safe."

After a moment, he steps away, taking his seat at the head of the table - this is far more than a reunion, after all. His eyes barely catch on Fran, and Balthier says nothing and so it seems they are to be strangers to each other, only sky pirates riding a fair coincidence to the hope of a payout. The Marquis plays his cards so close to his chest one could easily miss he is even in the game.

"We did not know who to trust," Ashelia says, "and there were those who counseled that you and the Empire…"

Ondore nods. "A treacherous time for us all, and it may only become more so. I have heard on authority that Archadia now holds the Dusk Shard."

No malice in it, no blame, but the princess flinches anyway.

"The demand for Bhujerba's magicite is greater than ever, and more and more it goes to a single purpose." Ondore continues. "Archades will not rest in her desire for dominion over all. Even sailing the _Alexander_ through the jagd only raises their ambitions. Now that they yet again hold one of the Dynast-King's treasures…"

"You believe they will try to weaponize the Nethicite?" Vossler says.

"For all we know, Nabudis may have been their first attempt." The Marquis says. "We cannot say for certain what happened there, or by whose hand that blow was struck. But with a new Shard to study as they will… if Archadia can manufacture that power, if they can build more Shards like that of their own…"

"We must stop them." Ashelia says. "Bhujerba must stand with us now, against the Empire!"

Ondore only steeples his fingers together, calm and diplomatic and well used to saying things people do not want to hear.

"I do not mean to seem impolitic, but you have no army, Highness…"

"The Resistance-"

"Lies broken and scattered across Nalbina's dungeons, and beyond."

"We will try again." The princess vows, undaunted, but this time it's Vossler who shakes his head.

"With another man as Lord Consul, perhaps - but not Vayne Soldior. The confidence of our allies is badly shaken, my lady - no one wants to stand against him. We nearly lost everything in our attack on the palace - and if you had disappeared beyond Archadia's borders there would have been no hope."

"I am not afraid of Vayne Solidor." Ashelia says scornfully.

"It is a matter of leverage, Highness, more than courage." Ondore says. "As far as the world knows, you are gone and buried these two years. It would take no less than a proclamation from the Gran Kiltias himself, with proof of your birthright to reclaim your throne - far more than my simple word alone can provide." He pushes on, before she can protest. "You may yet have some avenues of support, even as you are now - though perhaps not as you expected to find them."

Ondore means Rozarria, that much is clear. He means political alliances instead of direct insurrection In time, with the right words in the right ears, likely a marriage as well, the Queen with a few unmatched heirs remaining. Vossler looks particularly grim and quiet at this, as if it were more than his fears of Archadia that kept him from seeking out the Marquis' aid sooner.

"I will not deliver Rabanastre from the claws of one empire, only to have it snatched up by another." Ashelia says quietly, and levels her gaze at Balthier again. "I heard you were with Vayne's brother in Bhujerba's mines. If you had found him out sooner, that might have proved leverage enough."

Balthier laughs at that, and it would not be the first that Fran has seen him talk his way into a beating, though the princess manages to restrain herself, fists no doubt white-knuckled beneath the table.

"Do you believe me so incapable, that I could not detain a child?"

"I certainly believe you could, majesty, as I believe the Marquis can tell you what happens to those men who have tried to make a pawn of Larsa Solidor. Better that fate denied you the chance to try. We were all of us very fortunate that nothing happened to that boy."

"He speaks the truth, Highness." Ondore says, attempting to calm her. "It would be… unwise to consider the young lord in such a manner, though perhaps we do not need to discount him entirely. I believe at least one of your party has spent quite some time in his company."

It takes Penelo a moment to realize the Marquis is speaking to her, and when she does her eyes widen in rather comic dismay.

"I… er, yes, milord. Some. He brought me back to Dalmasca," she smiles, "although I think I was mostly a convenient excuse, so that he could visit Rabanastre. The Lord Consul was there and we… we shared a meal. He wished to know about the city."

"You didn't tell him anything, did you?" Vaan says, and Penelo shrugs, obviously still baffled that it had happened at all, let alone that the Lord Consul might believe she had any useful information.

"He likely wanted to ensure you weren't set on his brother as a spy, I imagine." Balthier says, and Penelo blanches slightly, as if that particular doom hadn't yet crossed her mind.

"He… he gave me a pardon, for Vaan." The boy snorts, and Penelo glares back. "I didn't ask for one, I didn't think... I was too busy trying to explain that you weren't there to _murder him_, and then the Doctor-"

It's the first that Balthier betrays his lie of indifference, that one word enough to make him startle upright, though there is still no more than mild interest in his tone. "Doctor? Cidolfus Bunansa was with you in Rabanastre?"

Penelo nods.

The Marquis is equally surprised. Doctor Cid rarely ventures beyond the confines of the labs, too valuable to risk in Dalmasca were it not for some very good reason.

"Whatever Vayne is planning for Dalmasca, I will stop him." Ashelia says. "If none will aid me, I will go alone."

"You must have patience, Highness." Ondore says. "Now that you are here, and safe, we have options and opportunity both, but you must give it time."

"We don't _have_ time, Uncle!"

"Let me see this pardon of yours." Vossler says, and Penelo nods, unrolling the thick parchment to reveal what is certainly an official Archadian document, stupidly ornate. She glances at Balthier, who nods very slightly - yes, that is indeed Vayne's own hand. Vossler studies it for a long moment before speaking.

"There has been word, Highness, that the Lord Consul has also pardoned some of those in Nalbina who were not tied to our cause, innocent men swept up in the chaos. Our informants say he has shown… considerable restraint in his actions thus far. He did not come down on the city as he might have, punishing them for our actions. Compared to those who came before, I have heard it said that it was… fortunate he was there."

"It changes nothing." Ashelia says sharply, enough to make him wince slightly but he does not relent.

"It shows, perhaps, that he is not a man wholly without sense - a creature of cold logic, even if there is no heart in him. If we did have some leverage, as the Marquis suggests, perhaps… perhaps he might even be convinced to make a deal."

"As he dealt with my father?" The princess says, spearing that argument through the heart. Vossler does not respond.

Ondore coughs lightly, the sound of his chair sliding across the stones breaking the uncomfortable silence.

"I fear I must leave you for now, or else risk my absence noted. I have had rooms prepared here, until more suitable arrangements can be made." Ondore looks to Balthier, finally willing to at least admit he exists. "I will also have a proper reward for your services. Until then, please enjoy my hospitality, and my gratitude."

The Marquis lies so politely it might as well be the truth, and there is little more to be said, with his less-than-subtle hook firmly cast. Ondore knows what will happen next. Balthier knew it before they even stepped into this room. Only the princess has yet to realize the path he has set before her, the only choice she can bear to make.

* * *

Away from the _Strahl_, Balthier has somewhat fewer outlets for his frustration, and so Fran is unsurprised to see him taking apart his pistol for the third time since Nalbina, attempting to pry the last whispers of grit from the mechanisms. The wallpaper is a blue so faded that it nearly looks white, with tall windows and a vast view of the twisted gardens that sets Fran at ease despite herself, and she doubts it is a coincidence.

"The Marquis has a keen eye for detail."

"He wagered some on the single bed - though t'would not be the first you left me on the floor."

"You had fleas." All the more impressive, when she was the one with fur.

"Not one of my finer moments, I admit." Balthier grins, though it does not reach his eyes. "Nor is this."

Fran stands behind him, one hand on his shoulder and her claws raking lightly through his hair, a gesture of comfort she has found more use for as of late, though this feels the first since Rabanastre that they have managed to pause for breath.

"Will it trouble you too much to relinquish your room to a princess?" Balthier says. "I doubt she cares much for sharing."

"You believe she will go for the Strahl tonight?"

"I'm surprised her Highness did not hold us at sword point. Ondore all but loosed the girl like a hunting hound."

Spread out on the table are a set of maps, reading material while he works. Fran has seen them more than once in their time together - the tomb of the Dynast-King. Various sketches of Raithwall's final resting place, though she wonders at the accuracy of any map for a place that no one can enter.

"Proof of her identity? Truly? And I thought him a subtle man." The leash on Balthier's anger is slipping, the false indifference entirely gone. "Who even knows the worth of his word, as he never sees fit to risk it. Why bother, when she intends to fight the war on her own. As if it ever mattered that she lived at all. Let us see what the holy men of Bur-Omisace and their proclamations have to match the _Alexander_ blow for blow."

He is as tense as a man waiting for the axe to fall, and Fran can offer little counsel beyond her quiet support. It seems enough for now, as his voice gentles, a hand rising to stroke her arm. "What have you heard that is worth the sharing?"

Fran is not an intentional spy, though her long ears are hardly for show. Usually she chooses to ignore much of what is overheard, though this is not the time to deign to privacy. It had been worth her while to wander the halls, the princess locked away in her own solitary contemplation but her knights preferring the company of a bottle and two years of lost conversation.

"Vossler has doubts. He fears what is to come, and tells Basch this was never his battle to win. He has never had the mind for cunning nor the heart to lead this rebellion. The years have weighed heavily on him, in this duty. He loves the princess, but he fears what this has made of her."

"He is a fool to think he can ever barter with Vayne, but I understand the temptation. Who knows how much of the resistance funds came from Bhujerba in some fashion? Ondore will end all that - he wishes for the match with Rozarria, now that Ashelia is proved alive. Such an alliance would leave the Marquis in a very fine position, and Dalmasca's sovereignty certainly puts no fresh coin in his pocket." Balthier frowns. "He wants the Dawn Shard even more, though, and all the better that the princess take it upon herself to crack the crypt for him. I understand it now, he believes he will reverse engineer it, he thinks that is how they did it at Draklor. The nightmare of an Imperial stockpile is nothing more than the desire for his own."

"Is it possible? Could they create such a thing?"

Balthier's stillness speaks volumes, and Fran tries to imagine another Nabudis, or a dozen, and how long it would take before she could not even walk upon the earth.

"They will try. They will certainly try. Did you learn aught else?"

"Vossler wonders if Vaan and Penelo would be better off elsewhere. He does not think they are safe here."

"Nowhere is safe." Balthier says. "Vayne Solidor knows them by name now, there is no pardon that can alter that - and the boy has a poor habit of making himself known."

It had been perhaps slightly counterproductive for Vaan to begin his professional career as a thief by demanding they call him by name. Balthier is still not quite over that.

"It is right that we were there, to free Basch from that place, whatever else may come of it." Fran says. "It was good to hear them together, speaking of the past like old friends."

"Like brothers, though perhaps that is not the best comparison for fon Ronsenberg at present. I am glad that he is well, however. After all that time in Nalbina, I feared he might be past repair."

"He has his duty to shield him." Fran says, and Balthier makes a soft, considering sound.

"I remember what that was."

"… and now?" Fran chides, and Balthier tips his head back to smile at her. "Did you know of him then, in Archadia?"

"Gabranth?" Balthier frowns thoughtfully. "I doubt there are any in Archades who could claim to know his mind. Hardly a man for idle chatter. I could give you the conversations I heard him take part in on one hand, with enough fingers left over to order a round for the table. He was a terror in the ring, but quick enough to yield - he would not strike a man unprepared, and always gave quarter. Not the man I would choose for such treachery. Gabranth was sponsored by Drace's house, and she is not the kind to waste time on ruthless men. I never marked any great patriotic fervor in him, or ambition. The power of a Judge Magister is as much in legacy and connections - he must have known how little the title alone would favor him."

Fran has wondered now and then, what it looks like when Balthier thinks about the Empire, sifting through countless invisible patterns of history and obligation.

"I know the sort of man to betray his own for power, for wealth and glory. But does that man truly bother to pay courtesy calls to the dead? Fon Ronsenberg was as good as buried, yet Gabranth had not forgotten him. There is more to this than we know."

The soft knock at the door surprises both of them - even Fran had not heard it, though as she cants her head in the direction of the door it is soon clear why. A graceful shifting of weight, the slight, nervous tap of one toe against the floor as she raises a hand to knock again - Vaan had said Penelo was very light on her feet.

"Do come in." Balthier calls, and the door slowly, carefully edges open, the girl peeking inside only to freeze when she catches sight of Fran. A not uncommon reaction among humes, Fran has always found it rather amusing, and does her best to look unthreatening even as her nose twitches and a slight spike of discomfort settles in behind her eyes and she realizes that this girl is far more dangerous than she knows.

Fran does not have to look to know that Balthier's smile is warm and rich as brandy in firelight, and she drops her hand to the back of his neck, flexing her claws ever so slightly in warning as he pretends not to notice. He does not break hearts on purpose, but not all women come with armor.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt…" Penelo says carefully.

"I cannot imagine a more welcome one." It's difficult to keep from rolling her eyes when he is like this, and Fran steps away rather than risk upending his dashing pirate image, moving to a side table where her weapons lie. He is not the only one to leave Nalbina in some disarray - her blades need sharpening, and the fletching mended on a few unlucky arrows.

"I wanted to return this," Penelo says, holding out Balthier's handkerchief, "and say thank you, again. I don't think I would have seen Vaan again, if it weren't for you."

"I shall keep it close to my heart," Balthier says, and Fran does roll her eyes this time. She has witnessed Balthier flirt with himself in a mirror, she has _seen_ this happen. "Fortunately, your friend is tougher than he looks, and I believe I could say the same for you. I owe you an apology. It was truly a disgrace, that you might come to harm on my account."

"Oh, no… it wasn't…" Penelo pauses, as if knowing she ought not to ask but unable to stop herself. "It seems there are many people who are angry at you."

Balthier laughs. "You grow used to it, by the fifth or sixth bounty. Truly though, if I had known the path would lead you to Vayne Soldior…"

"He wasn't that bad." Penelo blurts, as if the words have been pent-up for too long. She seems terribly afraid of being overheard even with the door closed behind them, glancing from Fran to Balthier in turn. It is true the words edge dangerously close to treason, especially in the company she now finds herself, yet it seems Penelo cannot help but speak. Quite interesting, and Balthier is equally intrigued.

"He didn't… I mean, I understand what he's done. I was scared of him, and I believe it, that Her Highness… and Lord Basch, and that means that Reks, that he…" Penelo shakes her head quickly. "Please, forget I said anything."

"Vayne Solidor is a master at his art. Even the Marquis is loathe to confront him directly. Forgive me for being impolite, but he had little to lose in courting your good opinion. What matters is that you have faced down the serpent and survived. There is nothing to be ashamed of in that."

"I just… I don't understand. Larsa cares so much about everything, and everyone. He told me the purpose of his house was to do good for others, to put them before himself. I think he may be the kindest boy I've ever met - but he loves his brother, too, and believes in him. I just don't see how both can be true."

Balthier pauses for a long moment, this no longer the easy conversation it had been at the start. Fran wonders if he will change the subject, before he finally speaks again.

"I can do no more than relate a tale to you, of the only man who ever attempted to assassinate Larsa Solidor."

Penelo pales, but waits for him to continue.

"At the time Vayne was little more than twenty, with already three or four fair attempts on his life. Larsa was much too young to remember it - a moment's inattention, an explosion, the Judge Magisters not where they should have been. He escaped with no more than a few scratches, but that was more luck than anything. In some Houses, I suppose it might be viewed as a coming of age."

"Do you mean…" Penelo says, confused, "it was another House, in Archadia, that tried to…?"

"It is, as often as not. I would think both Empires have likely lost as many to their own infighting as ever in each other's wars. The only difference between this attempt and the thousand before was the response. Usually a House would return fire as best they could, a spate of blood for blood, perhaps a suit drawn up for the Judges to ignore. Instead, there was nothing. The Emperor made all the proper gestures, of course, but no _real_ consequences, as no one was sure who was truly responsible. No formal charges were ever filed - and then one day, House Durant, I believe, one of oldest of the Thirty Great Houses of Archadia, collapsed all but overnight."

"Vayne." Penelo says, and Balthier nods.

"He dismantled their House from the inside out, and even now I doubt any know how it was accomplished . Debts called in, assets frozen and deals waylaid - any hidden secret behind Durant's doors spun out into a greater scandal. It was quick and subtle and absolute, with every charge imaginable laid against them - except the attempt on Larsa Solidor's life. It was already known to those that needed the warning, what Durant was being punished for and by whom, and he drowned in the onslaught. All too soon, his children abandoned him for the safety of any House that would harbor them. His wife followed in short order. At the very last, Durant was forced to sell his name, and relinquish his House forever."

"I've heard the way they talk about…." Penelo says. "That's bad, isn't it?"

"It would have been kinder to kill him outright. Since the dawn of Archadia, there have been only a handful of Houses to meet such an end. It is usually takes generations of poor decisions and mismanagement. Vayne Solidor, barely of age, felled one of the most powerful families in the realm in little over a month. The message was clear - go after Vayne and it's business as usual, with shots fired and silent knives in back alleys, all quite civilized. Take one step toward Larsa, though, and find yourself erased from history."

"… and you don't believe he did that for his brother?"

Balthier goes quiet and still for a moment, arms crossed and eyes lost in shadow. "I think the boy provides an excellent reminder to the world of Vayne's abilities, and the extent of his reach. Larsa may be a challenge to him, one more lie skillfully told. I'd like to believe the interest in his brother is more than mere novelty, the vaguest flickers of whatever stands for the conscience of such a man. I do not pretend to know the mind of Vayne Solidor, but whatever the case, I greatly doubt if it will do any of us good for him to have his way."

"It sounds like you're planning to fight." Penelo says, with a small smile.

"I do prefer to run away when I can - much less of a hassle." Balthier sighs. "It takes a bit more coin to make mercenary work worth the while - though it does do wonders for one's dashing reputation."

"I don't think you need much help with that." A slight wryness in the girl's tone, not quite impressed - and Fran thinks that perhaps she is wrong, and Penelo is not in the habit of selling at discount for smooth-tongued knaves.

"I would ask, before you go - on the matter of Doctor Cid. I don't suppose the man spilled any useful state secrets while in your company? There's good money to be had in such information."

Fran blinks, fingers stilling on an arrow shaft. Penelo shakes her head.

"I'm sorry. I didn't… I wouldn't even have known what to ask."

"It's of no real consequence. May I inquire what you thought of him?"

The girl shifts again, yet another opinion she suspects will not be popular.

"He was kind to me. A bit… distracted, I suppose. He did not appreciate the heat."

"I imagine not. I thank you for your time, Penelo, and of course, the return of my handkerchief."

She nods, and looks as if she might wish to say goodnight to Fran but does not quite have the nerve, retreating quickly and closing the door quietly behind her. Fran finishes honing the edge of a knife, before moving back to where Balthier still sits in silence, looking out into empty space.

"So… there is something left in the old man for chivalry, at least." He sighs heavily, and shuts his eyes. "And now he has a Shard of his very own. The last they fell into such great fortune, the good Doctor tore the heart out of a nation. I wonder what he dreams of for an encore."

Balthier has never spoke the fear aloud, but she has known him long enough to imagine it. If this goes as it has, there may come a point that he is face to face with his father once more, and how many ways can that end? Fran must be the one to send this Doctor to the next world, should it come to that. Balthier might very well hate her for it, such things are complicated, but that is still better than having to spill the blood of his kin.

"What happened to that man? The fallen lord?"

"Durant, you mean? Hung himself by the chandelier in his front hall, though by then it was of little consequence. He was dead in all the ways that mattered the moment he surrendered the name. Vayne is nothing if not thorough - I am rather glad Penelo met the Solidor she did, first."

"It may not yet keep her from trouble." Fran says. "She holds the Nethicite."

Balthier looks up at her. "What?"

"The same piece that Larsa Solidor had with him in the mines. I do not imagine she took it from him."

He frowns. A shame they are not the pirates they seem or this little adventure would be over, that tiny rock valuable enough to retire on tenfold.

"Quite curious, to burden her with such a gift… and worth examining further, once we are quit from this place."

"You ought rest," she says. "I doubt we will tarry long."

Balthier groans and stretches, but he finally does stand, moving slowly toward the bed.

"I had hoped to gain a few more meals from this, at the very least. Do make sure to take _something_ before we leave, pry out a sconce or two, or at least grab a doorstop - and remind Nono to take care of the outer locks, so that Her Highness might pilfer our ship with a minimum of bother."

* * *

Fran prefers the ruined and overgrown gardens of the estate to the usual Bhujerban obsessions with perfection, far more grace in their wild beauty than the most well-manicured path. It is dark, and she is waiting for the princess to make her move, nothing else to do but enjoy a few quiet moments surrounded by the green, listening to the wild Bhujerban winds twist their way through the leaves and branches.

She steps into a small clearing, only to find she is not the only one enjoying the night's silence. Basch fon Ronsenberg stands with his eyes closed, head tipped back under the full moon and as still as if he had grown from the spot. He opens his eyes after a few moments, but her presence does not seem to trouble him. A viera can be many things - liar and spy and quite often confidante. Just enough difference between them, that humes do not feel the need to keep so many secrets. Or perhaps it is as Balthier suggests, that they believe the viera already find them wanting, and so feel no need to try and impress.

Whatever the reason, she is grateful at least not to add to his burdens and for a long time neither of them speak, preferring to stand quietly beneath what is ever the most breathtaking sky in Ivalice.

"I could not sleep." Basch finally says. "The room… it felt a bit stuffy. The walls…"

The ceilings in the estate are high and vaulted - but they are ceilings still, and a viera is never one to argue the value of open spaces, and the glittering spill of evening after so long underground.

"It is a fine night to watch the stars."

"Yes."

The heavens wheel by in peaceful silence. If Balthier were here, he might ask to hear a story her people tell of the skies, though there is not one he cannot recite back to her by now.

"It is strange." Basch says. "I still feel as if this is not quite real. As if _I_ am not quite… it was not always easy there in the dark, to keep track of time, and place. I cannot help but fear that this is - that it could all just be a dream."

"Do you often dream of being pursued by an Empire?"

Basch chuckles. It creaks a bit at the edges, dusty from disuse, but warm and steady nonetheless.

"I see your point."

He will go with them to Raithwall's Tomb. He would follow the princess to his grave without complaint. Fran doubts they will even have to round up Vaan and Penelo - the boy has followed her Highness with an eager curiosity, and the girl follows the boy. The princess is certainly possessed of a fearsome determination, though stealing a ship from thieves would be a daunting task even if Balthier did not secure the Strahl with all rationality of a jealous husband. If they wanted, it would be easy enough to do nothing at all, and let Ashelia curse over the control panels until morning.

"Vossler has left Bhujerba, to round up what remains of the scattered Resistance, and seek what support he can. I am tasked to watch over her Highness in his absence, though I doubt this was with her blessing." Basch smiles to the heavens. "He thinks her too unforgiving, but even I cannot argue she ought have faith in me."

"I do not think she blames you, even with what she has said. It is safer for her to trust no one, and when she does not know what to do it seems better to simply keep her distance from all. The princess believes she must carry the weight of this on her own, she believes it is what she is for. It will not be easy to change her mind."

Basch's expression is unreadable.

"I… would prefer it not be easy."

Fran's ears twitch slightly, at the sound of footsteps in the darkness, making their cautious way to where the Strahl lies waiting.

"I believe that you will get your wish."

* * *

1. One line of game dialogue in there.


	41. a conspiracy of cartographers 5

"Approaching the city, sir."

"Hold course and speed."

"Sir."

It's easier in many ways to navigate a ship the size of the _Ifrit, _even through the crowded airspace at the outskirts of Archades, when every other ship has good reason to stay out of the way. The ship will dock well north of the city on his departure, and Ghis does not know if he will be returned to it, prepared to parry Rozarria's next inevitable thrust, or if that honor will fall to another.

Doubtful that this day will end with his neck on the block, though there is hardly a faithful measure for such things anymore, the Emperor's judgments no longer to a purpose but their own inscrutable ends.

The mood aboard is tense, though Ghis is not particularly nervous, even if there hasn't yet been a response from the palace since their last missive - the girl spirited away but the Dusk Shard still in their grasp. He's had to imprison half the men from the deck until one of them proves traitor, not that Ghis thinks much will come of it. The damage has already been done, though perhaps not as bad as it might have been. If he'd been given the choice between girl and stone, it would have ended much the same.

The Dusk Shard gleams quietly back at him from the table, less a divine weapon now than an oversized paperweight. The men here do not know it is the prize, seeing only a crystal like any other, and if Ghis hadn't witnessed it react to Dalmasca's heir he might have dismissed it himself. He ought to send it to the stern, a far more secure location, but it's Doctor Cid's men on the engines, and he will not leave them alone for one moment with such a prize.

The sun sweeps out from behind a cloud bank, light glancing off windows and panels and armor, even kindling the Dusk Shard for a moment, a warm glow dancing in its depths, like the graceful swirl of a lady's dark skirts. It is beautiful and strange, though truth be told, Ghis cannot see much lasting value in even this fabled relic of the Dynast-King - a powerful weapon, to be sure, and certain to worry Rozarria, but it will take more than a single blow to deal any worthy damage.

The mad Doctor talks to stones like this. Stones and walls and open air, and it should have been no more than the folly of a dying house, but for the Nethicite. No reason the Empire's vast armies should not hold dominion over all - but for Vayne Solidor, and the Draklor Laboratories and the slow but certain dismantling of everything Ghis knows to be true. Power in the royal court has always been a bloody battle of inches, attrition across decades. Removing Vayne to Rabanastre has provided a moment's breathing room, but there is no doubt that Ghis is losing the war.

"We are being hailed, sir. The _Alexander_."

Hardly a need to say so, Ghis can see it from the window, the ship far on the horizon but caught in full sun, poised like winged victory against the sky. The most powerful airship in Ivalice several times over, and though it may well be the symbol of all that stands against him Ghis cannot deny his pride in it, absolute proof of the might of his nation and the reach of her blade.

"Well met, Judge Bergan. I hear things went rather well at the border."

Rumors of great chaos, and he likes to think of those panicked Rozarrians scattering madly from what was little more than a test, mistaking it for invasion. As if it mattered, as if it would not be like trying to outrun a hurricane.

A slight pause on the other side, and when the voice finally speaks it is dry and crisp and most importantly, not Bergan.

"Good afternoon, Judge Ghis." Zargabaath says. "I am happy to report that the ship functioned well within its requirements. The Emperor was greatly pleased."

The Emperor has been making changes at the last moment again, moving the Judges about in a shell game of his own design, and perhaps it is subtle insult and perhaps it is entirely irrational - or perhaps he is even losing the ability to tell one from the other. Ghis has marked such harmless eccentricities in other men of that age - but other men are not Gramis Gana Solidor.

"News has spread of an unfortunate disturbance in Dalmasca, and that it may have followed you home."

Gloating bastard. As if Zargabaath doesn't know. The tale of his vanished prisoner has likely funneled all the way into Old Archades by now, the loss of the leader of the so-called Resistance. The only benefit of a spotlight fixed on his failure is that all other news has likely fallen by the wayside. He would very much like to keep the news of the Dusk Shard as quiet as possible, for as long as he can.

"A minor complication, no doubt soon to be corrected. I would not speak further until I have delivered a full report to His Excellency."

"I will not hinder you a moment more. Good day, Judge Ghis."

A simplification of the worst kind, that the Judge Magisters stand as nothing but Imperial bodyguards, even if Drace seems hopelessly wedded to the task. No doubt each House tells its own story of the fall of the stratocracy and the rise of Solidor. Ghis knows it mainly as a matter of political convenience, an agreement between the strongest Houses for the benefit of them all.

The truth his family knows is that there had been a throne once, before there was a Solidor - and there had been a Ghis upon it. His House, both betrayer and betrayed. It certainly gives a man much to think about.

"Sir, you are cleared for transport to the palace."

"Very good. The bridge is yours."

"Sir."

Outside of combat maneuvers, a ship of the _Ifrit's_ size gives little sign when it changes course or slows, and even a turn seems more as if the ship is fixed while the world spins around it. As steady as walking on solid ground, and in these large ships even the hallways are a comfortable size.

He passes a cluster of men in the hall, gathered around one of the maintenance shafts, sparks flying from whatever work's being done deep within. The men are Draklor's artificers, a presence he is forced to tolerate for the sake of the ship, and because Vayne Solidor knows how to win an argument about their necessity. Barely of the military, they are still technically under his command, but they are aware of how little he knows about how to keep the ship in the sky, and any deference on their part is a mere technicality.

As now, when they see him and straighten up and salute, but it isn't until they catch sight of the Shard in his hands that they pay him any real attention, eyes going wide to a man. Grasping little mercenaries, with no pride for the uniforms they wear, no sense of the sacrifice - only coin and privilege. All of them the Doctor's spies, and what Cid knows Vayne is always soon to learn and Ghis cannot touch them without catching nine kinds of hell for it.

He is a Judge Magister, the Emperor's own will made flesh and steel, and of all the things Ghis thought could not fade, that he would not see whittled down day after day… Only two Houses in Archades can mark a truly unbroken line from the beginning, some combination of foresight and luck - and in the case of House Drace, a distinct lack of mercy - providing for at least one new Judge Magister for every generation.

Drace has no one who will take up her name, Gabranth the closest she can claim to any sort of successor. Ghis has four lovely daughters, all well married - but no sons. His eldest grandchild is still little more than a babe. He will not live to see a crimson cloak grace the shoulders of his heir - there will be no heir.

His grip tightens slightly around the Shard, and Ghis feels a twinge of pain midway up his arm. A memento of his training, from so many years ago. A broken limb long-healed, and yet it sees fit to remind him of the past now and then, if slightly more often as the years go by.

It will be all too easy for Vayne to set the name of Ghis aside, to step over it on his way into the future. The son is as paranoid as the father ever was, but Ghis has served the Emperor faithfully, to great acclaim. Most likely he faces a fate no worse than early retirement, and from there a country estate and swift obscurity. All his life only a footnote, with the the future belonging wholly to the skies.

Dalmasca, that dusty pile of stone, may have seen the last of anything he might call a victory.

* * *

At the peak of Gramis' power, Ghis could have stood guard in all three of the palace's audience chambers in a single day, the Emperor preferring to meet foreign diplomats in the larger, crimson room, well flanked with statues of Archadian heroes. The merchants and Senators he would see in smaller, private spaces, for those already well-versed in the Empire's history. The chambers all stand mostly unused these days, the Emperor too unwell to do more than keep short hours in Senate meetings, any other business taking place in a small room attached to his own suite. It lacks the power of the official chamber, the chair hardly even a throne but for the man seated in it.

Ghis can see it most clearly now, the waxen cast to his skin, the way his body sinks beneath the robe and crown. Gramis has been dying for a conveniently long time, but this may be the true end of it all. He is speaking to Drace, too low to be overheard. The Emperor prefers to meet with each Judge alone, all the better to keep them guessing about each other, to make sure no one ever can be certain of who has been given what commands.

"Your Excellency."

Ghis doesn't hesitate to kneel, bowing his head with the Dusk Shard carefully tucked in the crook of his arm. A portrait of contrition - far better to overdo, should Gramis be in a mood. Impossible to tell which Emperor might see fit to meet him - confident and stoic, withdrawn and diffident or paranoid and scheming. All of these are preferable to when Gramis waxes nostalgic.

It is damning to feel pity for one's lord. Ghis can appreciate the dread of knowing an entire nation stands in wait for that first rattle of breath, the first sign of the end, even as he loathes Gramis for his fear.

"Judge Ghis. I have been awaiting your arrival for some time. Leave us now, Drace. We shall continue at a later hour."

"Yes, my lord."

Drace is much too loyal for one who's been in the court as long as she has, long enough to know that Gramis does not often return such faithful devotion with equal reward. The only reason Ghis puts even the slightest weight to the suggestion that she and the Emperor might be lovers, although Ghis thinks that unswerving faith is more likely to be just another obligation inherited from her father. If Drace questions herself now, if she dares take one step onto that thinning ice how much more of her life might she have to rethink, or regret?

Whatever the case, their Houses have never been allies and Ghis sees no reason it ought to change. Drace has always shared the sentiment, little more than the slight tilt of her head to acknowledge his existence as she leaves the room, so expressionless it makes no difference that she has the helmet off.

Ghis removes his, setting the Dusk Shard down in front of the Emperor, and he is already certain there will be little rebuke for the loss of the princess, not with how Gramis stares at the stone.

It is unnerving, to see all those who are to protect Archadia so lost in their obsessions, so determined to chase down fairy tales. Only a fool would doubt the value of the Nethicite, even Ghis must give the Doctor that due, but the man sacrificed sanity and soul to achieve his goals, and he thinks the Emperor would give them all up just as easily. What madness has spread from Draklor, to place all their hopes and dreams on weapons they still barely understand.

"It is a shame about your prisoner, Ghis."

"My failure was unforgivable, your Grace. I will discover who aboard the _Ifrit_ dared to play at traitor, though it does seem the girl had unexpected allies well beyond the borders of Dalmasca."

"I imagine so." Gramis says. "I hope the Marquis enjoys his reunion."

"If you wish, my lord, I…"

The Emperor waves the thought away.

"Bhujerba is as yet unwilling to lose our coin from its coffers, and the insurgency is no longer your concern. The Lord Consul has made it quite clear he prefers be unfettered by our assistance, so we will allow him to face this situation as he sees fit."

He is not speaking only of a princess lost, but of another man never spoken of, a plan Ghis has still never heard about by any official means. Should Dalmasca discover the plot that stole their king from them, should fon Ronsenberg raise his voice in the streets and rally a new army, whatever help Vayne may request from the Empire will not quite reach him in time.

It's not the time or place for this kind of treachery. Rozarria is not some tiny desert kingdom with a scattering of ships in the sky - they are an equal, the Nethicite only one advantage and the merchant kings with plenty of their own. Dalmasca is not some piece to be sacrificed for the death of one man, even if it is Vayne Soldior.

If Gramis wasn't such a coward in this, frozen in place by the weight of old ghosts, then Ghis might have put a sword through Vayne the night of the fete and been done with it. As if the gods mark such difference between sins - if anything, Ghis thinks simple murder far more honorable than death by inaction. Yet Gramis refuses to make the judgement he knows he must, refuses to see that while Archadia did not suffer so greatly for whatever he believes are his wicked deeds, he may yet do untold damage with his penance.

"Lord Zargabaath contacted me, from the _Alexander_. He said the flight was a great success."

Gramis scoffs, though it seems to cost him a bit too much breath. "Rozarria protested immediately, of course. Called it an act of war. As if it wasn't the longest stretch of empty land in Ivalice, in case anything _did_ go amiss. We sent the official statement from Draklor - the 'widest possible margin of error.' I don't imagine it will change much in the end." Ghis can hear the dry rasp as the Emperor rubs his hands together. "You are curious, why I bestowed such an honor upon Zargabaath, and kept Bergan here in the city?"

"I do not question the wisdom of your appointments, my lord. Zargabaath is a fine commander for the fleet."

The Emperor cuts him a look, sharp and piercing - not buying his deference for a moment, and once again Ghis wonders what is act and what is true and not if Gramis is dangerous - of course he is, he always has been - but for what reason is he dangerous _today_?

"Bergan remains here in Archadia. I will be sending Zargabaath out with the Eighth, aboard the Leviathan, under the Lord Consul's stewardship from Dalmasca. He seems to get along with Vayne, and in times such as these I would prefer to keep those I can trust close at hand."

Ghis wonders if Zargabaath even realizes he's made a misstep, that the Emperor has quietly shifted his allegiance from unquestioned to suspicious, with likely little cause. He has no idea where he himself stands in His Excellency's esteem, or for how long, and it all may just as likely shift back again before Zargabaath is any the wiser. Still, if Ghis is in Gramis' good graces this is all far better than he expected - even if does cast further doubts on the Emperor's judgment.

"I would know your mind on the southern border."

"I saw no mark of Rozarrian involvement, your Grace, at least not openly. The Lord Consul handled the situation in Rabanastre with all skill and efficiency. I believe, however, that he was far too lenient, and they will continue to punish him for it. It will no doubt keep him occupied for the immediate future."

"He truly seeks to truly make a place for himself there, in such a land?" The scornful note in the Emperor's voice makes such a goal sound only foolish, but Ghis knows better. The benefit of having Vayne so distant from Archades is the equal penalty of not being able to track his movements or his gains.

"Vayne seeks what he has always sought, your Grace."

In the wrong mood, this would strike His Excellency as too forward, too presumptuous and even uncharitable, but at the moment Gramis only nods, looking out as if he might catch sight of the desert kingdom, of the Lord Consul in the midst of some treasonous plot.

"Larsa is with him now, as is Cidolfus Bunansa."

"The Doctor left his lab? Voluntarily?"

"By the time I would have denied it, he was already halfway there. It is no matter, they will return soon enough."

An edge in the Emperor's tone - yes, it certainly does matter, one more reminder where the Doctor's true loyalties lie. Ghis does not know and does not want to know how Vayne ever managed to gain such devotion from a lunatic, it is enough to simply endure the results.

Nothing in this world quite as irritating as gaining a straight answer from either man, just as likely Cid will receive a summons or Vayne will remember some appointment and they'll happily excuse themselves from all responsibility. Put them together and it's infinitely worse, a whole world of little glances and the slightest shifts of expression standing in for any sensible conversation. No matter how expressionless Vayne remains throughout, there's no doubt that a good deal of that silence is composed in marking Ghis' failings. Vayne has never respected him, has never seen the Judge Magisters as anything better than a half-broken tool, a hindrance to be worked with until the improvement presented itself.

Contemplating regicide is, in its own way, practically a form of patriotism in Archades, but with Vayne it has always been something to savor.

"Larsa will be of age soon." The Emperor says.

"Yes, my lord."

"I would have you begin the security preparations for the entire city. I wish this to be a celebration to eclipse all others."

Ghis might question the sanity of such festivities on the advent of battle, though by the time the young lord's birthday arrives they may very well be in the middle of it. Still, there is a certain level of decorum that must be attended to, regardless of conflict or strife, and House Ghis has not lasted so long by telling the Emperor what he cannot do.

"It will be done, my lord. The safety of Lord Larsa is ever paramount."

The Emperor nods, distractedly. Ghis had been prepared to leave the Shard and his apologies and gain little else from this meeting, but it seems even now that Gramis is not quite finished.

"I have been… made aware of an offer. Quietly, of course - but there are those among the Senators who believe that for the sake of stability, in this time of growing strife the people would be set at ease to know Archadia stands allied, that such rifts that might allow our enemies time to strike have been healed before the fighting starts."

The only way to stop the Senate, the Judges and the Emperor from fighting would be to light one on fire, drop it on the other and put the blaze out with the ashes of the third. It has been the way of the world from before the days of his father's father. Ghis waits for some sign of mockery, of that same self-awareness on the Emperor's face, and is stunned when it does not come.

"The Senate would back Larsa for Emperor…. if I were to publicly denounce Vayne."

The Senate hopes Vayne will have to stop for breath somewhere between killing his father and the little upstart, and they can take advantage of that moment's inattention to bomb him to death. The last thing they are set to suffer through is another century under House Solidor rule, no matter how pliable Larsa might prove. Ghis can't help but wonder what their plans are to get rid of the Judge Magisters, if that band of dried-out, useless husks actually believe they can lead an army.

Gods, but he can see them try. Ghis can already imagine their obscene, ridiculous plan from one end to the other, with the same absurd stroke of luck that rid them of Solidors somehow dismantling the Judge Magisters as well - and Rozarria would watch, and sweep in just as the fools were patting themselves on the back and toasting to their victory. Whatever remained of the Empire in that aftermath, it would be little more than what the Senate could beg to keep, whatever the merchant lords picked from their teeth when they had finished with the carcass.

If there is anything in him that ever called itself worthy, Ghis cannot allow that to happen.

"Do I have your oath, Judge Ghis, that you will stand by my decision, and defend the Empire?"

What sort of insult to House and history, that the question even needs to be asked?

"I am a guardian of Archadia, Your Excellency. It is not in me to forsake that vow."

* * *

Blue-black clouds lay like lace across a slowly darkening sky, as Ghis sits in a narrow, straight backed pew in the rear of a cathedral perched on the top floor of one of Tsenoble's many towers. He has never paid much thought to the world beyond this one, neither the scattered pagan gods of the more provincial soldiers nor the grand and all-encompassing faith of Bur-Omisace. Of course he gives his tithe, and bows his head as low as anyone, but Ghis has never pondered the dispensation of his soul, what it is or where it is going, and when he is dead he doubts he will care much even then.

What the church is at this moment is a public space mostly abandoned in off hours, where his presence would be easy enough to explain away. Vast enough that Ghis can keep an eye on all in attendance - an old man and an old woman at the very front, no one else to be seen. It is also a place that sees little use from the men of Draklor. A few are devout, but there is little encouragement to be so, and most of them prefer to use the tools in their own hands rather than petition the interest of a higher power.

So no one is watching, when the man slips into the seat next to his, his eyes to the ground like a good and penitent sinner. A finely dressed noble of the district, though the cuffs on his coat are just starting to fray. Less a mark against his nobility than of his disinterest in it - the man comes from an old and well-established House, though one not quite illustrious enough to pitch him out on his ear when he discovered a love for the sciences.

It is a story with a cast of familiar characters, men who toil furiously to prop up indolents preferring to live off former glories. In this case, one high-ranking artificer from Draklor desperately struggling to keep up appearances. Despite all his coin, a single man can do only so much to stave off disaster, especially when he is the third son, when such sacrifice is his birthright. All too easy to lose oneself to obligation, and drag all the best parts of one's life down into the same muck.

This particular scientist has a son, who is strong and fair and all that a son should be. A Judge, and well-regarded, with a wife and a child and great loyalty to his House. A man who could not help but act when the time came to see how hard his father struggled, and of course then the moment of desperation, the one fatal choice - selling secrets to Rozarria. It doesn't matter how little information was shared, or if there was never any real consequence. The treason is all that matters. One word from Ghis and the son will be executed, his name stripped of all honor and that will surely be enough to bring the entire House down with him. If it had been any other man, Ghis would have done it months ago, but with this the artificer's position does him one final service.

It is Ghis' best and only connection into the inner workings of Draklor, the father turned traitor to spare the life of a traitorous son. Usually the Judge Magister is the one to call these meetings, to tear the man down until some new sliver of information slips free, though this time it is the scientist who called him out, almost at the moment of his return. He has a box with him, covered in a cloth, now resting beneath the seat. Ghis considers that it might be a bomb, but he rather doubts the man has the nerve.

"Do you know why the Doctor left for Dalmasca?"

The scientist flinches from the sound of his voice. He looks more pale than usual, even his slight movements tense and strained. Ghis must take care with how hard he pushes against this desperation, or else watch the man fall apart completely, like one of his own engines pulling itself to pieces.

"I imagine he was concerned for Lord Vayne. Also, he may have heard of your recovery of the Dusk Shard, though I understand it has returned with you to Archades."

"It is with the Emperor now."

The man shudders, gazing down at his clenched hands. "I hope His Excellency will exercise all due caution."

"Is it truly of the same power that leveled Nabudis? It seems impossible something so small could-"

The scientist stares at him then, only stares, the way Ghis regard Senators when they think to speak of war. He very much doubts Gramis will let the Shard out of his sight, but it might be worth ensuring no curious scholars or random magicks stray too close.

"You called me here for a purpose, I assume."

The man nods, swallows, flexes his hands and nods again. A misery of nervous tics, until it is all Ghis can do not to reach out and shake him still.

"I did not… there hasn't been time, and with Cid gone and the Alexander set to fly- it's been weeks of work at all hours, and even then, we didn't know if-"

"You give me excuses, not news. Excuses will not keep your House from falling."

The scientist flinches, and nods gravely, before reaching underneath his seat and bringing up the box he'd stowed there. He flips back the cloth, unlatches the door and then there is a small white dove in his hands, its head tipping cautiously this way and that but otherwise calm. Before Ghis can ask the obvious question, the man's hands close around it, and he swiftly wrings the creature's neck. It lies limp in his lap, wings splayed and now Ghis is sure he has pushed the man too far - if he hadn't been cracked from the start. A bit of useful technology is all that has ever separated Draklor from the madhouse.

"Wait." The scientist says, as if sensing his mood, his eyes still fixed on the dead animal - and as Ghis watches, he sees the tiny chest rise and fall with an impossible breath, the wings twitching, and then the bird lifts its head, ruffling its feathers as if only just waking from a nap.

"I can kill it again, if you'd like, or you can try it yourself. I had to kill it a few times myself, to be sure of what I was looking at, and that was after I studied his notes."

Ghis had been there, in the capital of Landis on the day they'd finally torn down the silver-blue of the republic and raised Archadian colors in its stead. He still has the flag, a prize of war from a day that could make the whole world seem new. The same as the day he had first disappeared beneath the helm of a Judge Magister - and now Ghis feels it once more, that potential, staring down into the blank gaze of a simple beast, or what ought to be…

"It's not invincible." The scientist continues on. "If it bled for too long, or maybe drowned - it _can_ be killed, but far less easily than one might expect, and as you can see, the ability to heal quickly from even mortal wounds is… considerable."

"How is such a thing possible?"

"Cid's always in his lab, and even when he's not… but with everyone working on the _Alexander_ and the Doctor gone, I was able to find a way inside. We all know he works on more than just the ships - his pet projects, his studies of the Nethicite. I never imagined… I never could have thought…." He's rambling, the greatest downside to dealing with his sort, but after a moment the artificer manages to find his point again. "Using Nethicite on living tissue - he's been able to meld it to the bones without killing the subject. It's incredible."

"What is it _for_?"

The second time in so many minutes that the man looks at him as if he were an imbecile, and Ghis might be tempted to remind him of all he stands to lose but reason holds him in check because this is far more important than his pride. He may not be a man of science but he can understand that at least.

"A test case. A lot of his research… it gets very complicated and impossibly obscure, but he seems to think that he could transfer this procedure to… to a hume. A sort of perfect weapon, a… divine soldier, if you're feeling poetic." The man carefully puts the dove back in its small enclosure, and on a second glance Ghis can see it has been reinforced. "It will scratch its way free of a normal cage, given half the chance. Cid believes that in humes, it might also increase their magickal potential as well as their strength and resilience, or so his notes say…"

"Do you have these notes?"

The scientist shakes his head. "It's not just… there's at least a half-dozen books full, and those are just what I saw."

"Who else knows of this?"

"No one. Just… just Cid, and I, and now you, Judge Magister."

"I want everything you have. Every word, and I'll be taking this experiment with me as well."

The man pales. "I can't just… I mean, I wasn't even sure how I'd get this back to… it was one thing, sir, with everyone occupied at the test flight, but now that it's over-"

"That is not your concern. I will let you know when to move, and provide a necessary distraction for your colleagues. I need you to bring me the information you have on this procedure. I want it all."

"You're not going to… I mean, I don't want anyone to get hurt, and the Doctor… he'll be back any day now. Cid will know right away what's happened…"

"That is not your concern."

The man shifts uncomfortably in his seat, looking up toward the front of the room, perhaps even using this church for its intended purpose, at least for a moment. Ghis is fortunate, really, that he's found this man - unambitious and timid, a creature who wouldn't have come this far without a lash at his heels. If the scientist were thinking clearly, he would realize how much further he could take what he knows. A find like this… he could laugh off Ghis' threats from atop his own throne, if he did not lack the courage.

"If I do this for you, then it means… it means that my son will…"

"As long as he does not make himself known to me, I see no reason to pursue this matter further."

The scientist makes a sound, as if all the air has squeezed out of him at once. It does not seem quite like relief - he certainly doesn't speak or even move when the Judge Magister stands, picking up the cloth-covered box as he passes. The priests are lighting candles, and Ghis can hear late afternoon psalms being sung, echoing like old memories down the long marble hall.

Odd, really, that they see the need to bother. The Empire has never favored tales of divine right, no gods singling out one man over the next. House Solidor has held the throne for so long because they are strong and cunning, nothing more. Archadia may not be as egalitarian as her claims, but it is still true - anyone can rule her who has the will to do so.

* * *

Practice swords may be blunt but they're plenty heavy and it still hurts like hell to catch one full across the side. Ghis grunts, drawing his shoulder up to shield himself as Bergan pushes his advantage, nothing to do but take the blows that follow, until it feels like his arm may well drop off and make a run for it.

"You're distracted today." Bergan says, taking a step back, shifting his stance and barely winded. Not a sword in this world he doesn't wield like a war hammer, little finesse to his style, just a sheer and brutal joy - though it certainly gets the job done. It's been a while since their last duel, but it isn't long before they fall into a comfortable and familiar pattern of beating each other senseless. Ghis feels a little of his frustration fade with each blow that does connect, his quick sword a fair enough match against the other man's unrelenting strength.

He has five years in rank over Bergan, the man's House of a lower ranking, though only off the battlefield. A warrior born from warriors, Bergan has two sons of his own, both Judges of fierce reputation and looking to make their name in the coming war. Ghis knows of Bergan's dream - to see both his sons as Judge Magisters, and if it is an impossible goal it may be for the lack of a decent Emperor to serve, than their ability to do so.

Ghis is not at his most focused, if for good reason, though Bergan is not one for excuses, and the next blow knocks him off balance even as another rips the sword from his hand. He goes down, flat on his back and staring at the point of Bergan's sword, at least half a dozen bruises he is feeling now and will be feeling later, his most clever bit of spell work only going so far. Ghis has not yet given over to time and entropy, but he knows it is coming, while Bergan still bests men half his age and utterly ignores the passing of seasons.

"Distracted." Bergan says again, and spits into the dirt. "One of your daughters tumble her gardener? Or is it finally the wife?"

"Look to your own." Ghis laughs, getting to his feet. It had been a good enough match for both their Houses, save for the lack of sons, but with his children grown and wed and gone his wife had long since retired to the country. It always satisfied her more than life in Archades, and he doubts she thinks on him any more than he considers her. Bergan's wife lives in the city, but she is a nervous thing, prone to all sorts of odd complaints, and home is her own private suite in a hospital wing as much as anywhere.

"What is it, then? Still angry you lost the girl in Dalmasca?"

Ghis frowns. "You're not at all upset that Zargabaath was the one to charge Rozarria's lines?"

He already knows the answer is no - Bergan gives not a damn for status or court politics, perhaps the only reason his House had never risen as high as it could have. Unlike so many others, he is well content to follow orders as long as those orders put him on a battlefield, as long as he might take the field and crush whatever seeks to oppose him. A simple man, though not a stupid one, and many have made that mistake and not lived long enough to correct it.

Bergan shrugs. "It was an airship. What is there to do in an airship but give orders and wave your arms about? No meat in it. Nothing to satisfy."

He has allowed Ghis a moment of breathing space, but no more than that, and Bergan raises his swords once more, shifting into a fighting stance. Ghis replies in kind, raising his own sword high - and they clash, and clash again, the same as it has been for years before this, and Ghis takes no small comfort in the familiar even though he knows it must change - that it already has. A few more strikes, and blade meets blade without either giving ground, Bergan pushing back against his blade, a moment trapped at deadlock.

"The Emperor… is thinking of announcing a change in succession." Ghis says, and then comes the slide of steel-on-steel, Bergan's slice to his parry, once and twice -

"So the Senate's finally managed to bend his ear?" Bergan growls in disgust. "What's their offer?"

"The same old mix of flattery and fear, I imagine - but it seems that Gramis has grown desperate enough to listen." Ghis dodges a vicious overhand, and Bergan blocks his counter with eager violence, batting his sword away, waiting for the next attack. One man, at least, who would not mind a civil war.

"So what is it? Are we to be without an Emperor?"

"The boy."

Ghis snorts. "Same difference then. Vayne will kill them for it, if they give him half the chance. All of them."

"Yes," Ghis says. "He will."

Ghis has never outfought Bergan in these matches of theirs, usually managing a draw, though that isn't always guaranteed. No one among the common soldiers has any chance of besting him, and even among the Judge Magisters there is only one who ventured close. Bergan and Gabranth had not been allowed to finish that duel, and he doubts either of them have forgotten it.

"About time we got to the end of it." Bergan grins wolfishly. "I can't say it's not clever on their part. No matter what Vayne does, they're set to hang him for it. Unless he's waiting on them for some reason of his own."

"I do love trying to think like a Soldior." Ghis grimaces, and takes another whack to the side for his trouble.

"None of it will matter, once Rozarria remembers they've got a war to fight." Bergan says. "Let the politicians squabble, let Vayne rout them for good - what matters is getting in on the ground. I hear you didn't get much action in Rabanastre. Wish I'd been there, I'd have loved to put the fear in them."

"As if there was anyone worth fighting." Ghis says. "I wouldn't be so eager for battle - there's no reason it won't be like it was with Nabradia, if not worse. They are taking the war from us, Bergan. The further we're pulled from the men, the more we're forced us to command from the air - soon the soldiers will admire us as much as we do the Senators. It'll be those scrawny fools from Draklor giving the orders next, just you wait."

Bergan doesn't respond, and Ghis knows that he's struck true, enough of a reminder to bring their sparring to a rather disheartening end.

He hadn't been exactly sure when he'd stepped out of the cathedral, of what would come next. Ghis had no plan, only the desperate promise of a coward and a box full of the impossible. He hadn't even been certain what speaking to Bergan might accomplish, though it was clear he could not move forward alone. Just what the future holds, that ultimate goal, the full promise of what he's seen - the thought of it grows larger and larger inside him by the moment.

His blood is as noble as any in Archades, and Ghis has spilled it without question, he has led the charge once and again. Whatever the feeble connivers in the court think they control, he has an army pledged beneath his banner, and they know the man they serve. Add to that Bergan's forces, loyal as his own… and now this new power, one that may well eclipse all others?

Ghis thinks he might be starting to understand the edges of the Doctor's madness. It is all the matter of a simple question, really - _why not_?

He is not a young man, and when he dies the name will go with him. Even if Ghis had an heir, even in the best of all possible worlds, could he truly ever bow to Vayne Soldior? If there is another way - no matter how unlikely, how unimaginable - is it not his obligation to his House and his country and all that he is to try?

Just think of what Archadia could become, cut free from sycophants and pretenders and all the useless trappings of politics. Consider the Empire as it ought to be, fresh and bright as a blade new-forged and poised to bring all Ivalice under her banner, Archadia forever secure against her enemies, within and without.

Imagine the first breath of quiet after that last fight, with the battle standard of Rozarria in his hands.

_Why not?_

Ghis moves over to the wall. The other Judge marked the box when he walked in, but paid it no greater attention - Bergan is good for some things, but imagination is not his strongest suit.

"Kill this for me, won't you?"

He opens the cage hard enough to rattle it, to spook the bird into flight - right into the path of Bergan's sword. No arguing for the man's reflexes, the blade up and pinning the bird to the wall before the last stray feather hits the ground. Bergan frowns, looking to Ghis and back to the bird and it's difficult not to laugh, remembering his own suspicions and for a moment he thinks maybe it is all just a delusion. If anyone in the world could force the world into sanity, it would be Bergan.

"You're certain it's dead?"

Bergan's eyes narrow slightly, rather baffled now, and he gives the sword a slight twist, bones grinding and cracking before he draws the sword away and lets what's left of the poor creature hit the ground with a soft, wet sound.

It doesn't take long. Just enough time for Bergan to glance at him again, obviously wondering what all that sparring's knocked loose - and then the wings flap and flutter, tiny bones setting themselves back into place and the blood is dark on the feathers but Ghis knows the wound beneath it is gone. Bergan had all but split the creature in two but here it is, fluttering about the room as they both stare after it. Nothing surprises the man, though Ghis thinks this may have finally come close.

"Hn."

"Indeed." Ghis says. "One of the mad Doctor's miracles, fresh off the vine."

Bergan pulls a face at that, with even less patience for the labs than he does, but he does not look away. Waiting to hear more.

"A new facet to the Nethicite's power, so I've been told. I believe we have been given… a rare opportunity. Act quickly enough, and we may find the possibilities to be near infinite in scope." Bergan notices the invitation there, but remains silent. "I'm told the procedure enhances healing, and magickal ability, and strength quite considerably." Indeed, even as they watch the little creature begins to peck what is soon a rather large crack into the window at the other side of the room, though it is still not quite strong enough to gain it's freedom. "A process ultimately intended for humes."

He waits - and then Bergan does smile, just a little. No, not at all a stupid man.

"How do you know it will work?"

"If the lunatic didn't get results, we could have been done with him long ago. I doubt Bunansa's put all this effort in for no reward - and perhaps… even then, this might be a gamble worth the risk. Neutrality will do us few favors in the world to come - and I would say to you, Bergan, that we deserve far better than the end that will be offered us."

"You want to be Emperor."

Bergan says it flatly, no sign of approval or disdain, and no, Ghis has not thought it in exactly those terms - but really, where else can it end? No one will ever believe him, this it is not all about wresting power for himself. All he desires is returning the Empire to her proper state of grace - but it is true, that Archadia is devoid of those who would do anything but use her for their own twisted intrigues and petty squabbling. If he takes one step down this path, he will be the enemy of them all.

Ghis cannot tell what Bergan is thinking, or if he's about to see how much damage a practice blade might be capable of. Fortunately, the other man does not keep him waiting long.

"I doubt you'll need any bodyguards, even before the Senate has been dealt with."

"No." Ghis says, and smiles. "I will wish to restructure the ground forces, though. We could do with a stronger central command."

"Lord Zargabaath will no doubt take offense with such a plan, even if he were invited."

Whatever the Emperor's fears, the man does seem unfailingly loyal to House Solidor. More's the pity.

"As would Drace, I imagine, and her little protege."

"Ah, Gabranth." Bergan says, with a sound like a blade sliding home. "You still have not accounted for the largest obstacle in your plan - or his brother."

The elder Solidor is by far the greatest threat to his fledgling goal, though Vayne's current distance from the capital provides the closest they'll get to opportunity. Bergan is right, however - he has overlooked the boy entirely.

"You have some quarrel with Lord Larsa?" It hardly seems possible, he is a gentle youth. Useless as the worst of them, but hardly his fault. Already born to the disadvantage of being too noble to fight, and deliberately coddled and blunted so he might never present a threat. Ghis is hardly unfamiliar with bloodshed, the blind ease with which war dispatches both the guilty and the innocent, and yet it seems… somewhat excessive, even so. Bergan marks his hesitance.

"He's not a child. He's a Solidor. If you'd got rid of the last one at his age, we wouldn't have this problem now."

Ghis nods. "You may very well be right."

"Don't worry. When the time comes, I'll take care of it."

In the corner of the room, the bird still scrabbles frantically against the glass, trying to reach the sky.

"You are a man of odd principles, Bergan."

He shrugs. "It's the world as it is, nothing more. We all fight, we all die, one day or the next. No sense trying to make it greater than that."

"I had thought much the same, before today." Ghis says, and Bergan rolls his eyes.

"Just as long as you don't start rambling like those fools from that damned lab."

"The reins of history, eh?" Ghis chuckles, and imagines he can already feel a trickle of that dread power uncurling through his veins, burning away everything between him and the future as it will be. A world without compromise.

"Come now, Bergan, don't you want to be a god?"

* * *

1. Yeah, I didn't forget about that plot point of putting Nethicite into people.

2. All right, and with that we've reached the end of this particular chunk of story and... just a little over 250,000 words. Well then. *throws confetti*


End file.
